41 
A PRIZE ESSAY. 
of ammonia. Cast your eye on the table (page 38) of 
the amount of urea or ammonia furnished by various 
animals. No one exceeds the hog. He seems spe¬ 
cially formed by nature for this office. He eats every¬ 
thing. His habits require very little of that class of 
food which forms flesh and blood. He is a fat former, 
a magazine of lard, a real oil butt, and demands, there¬ 
fore, the food essential to form fat and keep up his 
heat. He returns, of course, having little lean meat 
to form, (nobody would praise him for that,) having 
little flesh to form to increase his size, he returns 
quickly the waste his body suffers as urea, which be¬ 
comes ammonia. But it is only the still, and quiet, 
and penned animal, which gives this valuable product. 
If we would cause him simply to produce the greatest 
amount of his manufactory, without taking into ac¬ 
count his labor in shovelling over the compost heap, 
perhaps no better rule can be given than the Shaker 
practice of feeding with lettuce leaves. Having little 
brains to replenish or build up, and not quick in his 
nerves, (for be it known to you, reader, the opium of 
lettuce leaves is supposed to contribute mainly to the 
formation of brain and nerves,) the opium-eating hog 
will return a vast amount of the nitrogen of his let¬ 
tuce, in the shape of ammonia. If now you add to the 
facts, common to the nourishment of swine, the action 
of ammonia on mould, as it has been explained, you 
will see that he who neglects to fill his yards with 
mould, and swine to convert it, overlooks one of the 
cheapest, most effectual, and certain modes of forming 
manure, which practice and theory unite in pronounc¬ 
ing the surest element of the farmer’s success. Not 
only is the quality of urine affected by age, sex, food, 
difference of animal, but the season also exerts an influ¬ 
ence upon this liquid. The urine of cattle often con¬ 
tains ammonia ready formed in summer, but never in 
winter. In cold weather, the amount of ammonia, or 
rather the principle affording it, is less ; often it is not 
one half in winter what it is in summer. This cer- 
