Jdo2 
increased by moistening it with water, and allow- 
ing it to ferment until it sours. When the object 
is to feed beasts well without fattening them, 
the quantity of the above substances, mixed with 
the straw, is diminished, or they are substituted 
by others, according to the products of each 
locality. Thus, pease, vetches, lupines, beans, 
millet, and especially maize, after being bruised 
or macerated in water, and mixed with straw, 
furnish an excellent food. The leaves of cabbage, 
and various leguminous plants, those of the elm, 
poplar, ash, maple, and oak, afford an advantage- 
ous mixture. Roots, especially carrots, turnips, 
and potatoes, are not less profitable. In wine 
countries, the refuse of grapes may also be em- 
ployed; in short, almost whatever comes to hand 
of farm produce. Salt ought always to enter 
into these preparations. The liking which cattle 
of all kinds evince for this substance, proves how 
useful it is to their health, and how much it adds 
to the energy of their digestive powers. The 
leaves of various plants may be made to undergo 
preparations, rendering them more inviting and 
more salubrious to cattle. Those of most of our 
forest trees, dried, and sprinkled with salt, yield 
an excellent fodder, which may be mixed with 
chopped straw. In Prussia and some other parts 
of Germany, a kind of choucroute is prepared, 
by putting cabbage, and even clover, in large 
stone receptacles, after chopping them and 
| sprinkling them with salt. The mixture is then 
allowed to ferment, and yields an excellent food. 
The peasants of Swabia preserve the leaves of 
cabbage, beet, radishes, salads, &c., for feeding 
their cattle. After throwing them into boiling- 
water, they heap them up in boxes, five or six 
feet square, which they construct of boards, fast- 
ened to four uprights; they then cover them 
with boards, on which they place stones. Every 
eighth day they add new layers of leaves, which 
they take care to salt. The whole becomes sour, 
and is preserved for winter use.” [Annales de 
CAgriculture Francaise. | 
The use of straw for litter is noticed in the 
articles Lirrnrr and Srasie; the proportioning 
and intermixing of it with feeces, in the article 
Farm-Yarp Manure; the part which it plays as 
a fertilizer, in the article Manurn; and the de- 
signs and principles of economizing it upon a 
farm, in the article Leasr. “The stalks of 
wheat, barley, oats, rye,” remarks Mr. Donald- 
son, “with occasional mixtures of spoiled hay, 
and the hanlm of vetches, pease, and beans, 
being mixed with the feces of the animals, 
much augment the bulk, and materially affect 
the quality of farm-yard manure. The consti- 
tuent parts of those substances, as shown by 
chemical analysis, are principally earths and 
earthy and soluble salts, and in different pro- 
portions, which by entering into combinations 
with the animal and more easily soluble mat- 
ters in the dung, retard the too rapid putrefac- 
tion of these substances, and constitute, with 
STRAW. 
proper mixing and preparation, by far the most 
efficacious and durable fertilizer yet known.’ 
“ All the various sorts of straw,” says Sir John 
Sinclair, “answer the purposes of litter. Some 
farmers prefer the straw of rye, others that of 
wheat, which absorbs a great quantity of urine 
and moisture. The straw of pease and beans, 
when well broken by threshing, makes soft bed- 
ding; but, if well harvested, should be applied 
to feeding stock. Cattle, when soiled on clover, 
and other articles, or fed on turnips, are kept in 
a state of greater comfort when they have a suf- 
ficiency of litter. In the London markets, straw 
for litter is drawn straight in handsome trusses ; 
and if threshed in mills, is less saleable, on ac- 
count of its being more bruised, less sightly in 
the truss, and less durable in use, an object of 
some importance where straw is so dear; at the 
same time, it is probable, that the advantage of 
a softer bed for the horses would more than 
compensate for the additional expense. It is 
singular that the ancients were accustomed to 
break straw upon stones, for the purpose of ren- 
dering it more easily mixed with dung, sooner 
dissolved, and better adapted for litter ; an ope- 
ration which is now so effectually done by means 
of the threshing-mill. By some, littering stock 
with straw, has been considered to be unneces- 
sary ; others contend that all the straw of a farm 
ought to be exclusively appropriated to that pur- 
pose, and none of it applied to feeding stock: the 
truth seems to lie between these extremes. In 
Arabia, where the finest horses in the world are 
kept, no straw is used as litter. In Sweden and 
in Russia, instances are quoted of horses lying on 
boards, and of cattle standing and lying on a 
framing of wood-work, without any straw, or 
substitute for it, as bedding. Such plans, how- 
ever, will not answer for horses, if exposed to 
severe labour, as, in that case, they require rest, 
in the most advantageous manner in which it 
can be given them. It may likewise be observed, 
that the principal advantage of littering, with a 
view to manure, arises from the straw absorbing 
the urine, for which purpose it is certainly well 
calculated. But wherever straw is scarce or dear, 
peat earth, or fine mould, might be advanta- 
geously employed for the mere absorption of 
urine. Other substitutes also might be used for 
litter, as fern, shellings of oats, or small shell 
sand, all of which have been found to answer. 
Straw, however, is the fittest article for this 
purpose, for, by fermentation, it is reduced into 
a gaseous state, and by moisture into a fluid 
state, and in either case, its whole substance is 
applicable as food for plants. The more of that 
article, therefore, that can be converted into 
manure, consistently with the other objects 
which require the farmer’s attention, so much 
the more will his interest be promoted. Mr. 
Young was of opinion, that it was impossible to 
raise sufficient quantities of manure, more espe- 
cially where soiling was practised, if any straw 
