turn into by Christmas?
Can't you tell? Into milk, of course, which you will drink; and into
horseflesh too, which you will use.

Use horseflesh? Not eat it?

No; we have not got as far as that. We did not even make up our minds to
taste the Cambridge donkey. But every time the horse draws the carriage,
he uses up so much muscle; and that muscle he must get back again by
eating hay and corn; and that hay and corn must be put back again into
the land by manure, or there will be all the less for the horse next
year. For one cannot eat one's cake and keep it too; and no more can one
eat one's grass.

So this field is a truly wonderful place. It is no ugly pile of brick
and mortar, with a tall chimney pouring out smoke and evil smells, with
unhealthy, haggard people toiling inside. Why do you look surprised?

Because--because nobody ever said it was. You mean a manufactory.

Well, and this hay-field is a manufactory: only like most of Madam How's
workshops, infinitely more beautiful, as well as infinitely more crafty,
than any manufactory of man's building. It is beautiful to behold, and
healthy to work in; a joy and blessing alike to the eye, and the mind,
and the body: and yet it is a manufactory.

But a manufactory of what?

Of milk of course, and cows, and sheep, and horses; and of your body and
mine--for we shall drink the milk and eat the meat. And therefore it is
a flesh and milk manufactory. We must put into it every year yard-stuff,
tank-stuff, guano, bones, and anything and everything of that kin, that
Madam How may cook it for us into grass, and cook the grass again into
milk and meat. But if we don't give Madam How material to work on, we
cannot expect her to work for us. And what do you think will happen
then? She will set to work for herself. The rich grasses will dwindle
for want of ammonia (that is smelling salts), and the rich clovers for
want of phosphates (that is bone-earth): and in their places will come
over the bank the old weeds and grass off the moor, which have not room
to get in now, because the ground is coveted already. They want no
ammonia nor phosphates--at all events they have none, and that is why the
cattle on the moor never get fat. So they can live where these rich
grasses cannot. And then they will conquer and thrive; and the Field
will turn into Wild once more.

Ah, my child, thank God for your forefathers, when you look over that
boundary mark. For the diff