le for the plants in our
cold wet soil, and in the unmanured part of the field many of them
perished, and those that survived made very little progress, from
having no stimulus at the roots. Thinking it desirable to apply my
experimental manures in moist weather, I waited until the 6th May,
when I treated that part of the field which had _not_ been manured
(three-fourths of the whole) in the following manner. I applied
guano to one-fourth, at the rate of two hundredweight to the
statute acre, and the same weight of nitrate of soda over another
fourth, leaving one-fourth entirely without manure. The wheat
manured with the guano and nitrate of soda grew vigorously, and
the ears, more particularly in the part manured with guano, were
the finest I had ever seen, but when it came to ripen it
shrivelled in the ear, and the sample was very indifferent; the
soil being evidently deficient in some property necessary for
perfecting the grain. The crop also suffered much from the
depredations of the birds.

The portion manured with night-soil produced
to the statute acre 32 bushels of 60 lbs. each.

Guano " " 27 " " "
Nitrate of Soda " " 27 " " "
Unmanured part " " 19 2/3 " " "

I give these details to show that the land was in an exhausted
state previous to the commencement of the experiment I am now
about to detail. After the crop of 1842 was reaped, the land was
immediately ploughed up, and the season being very favourable, it
was tolerably well cleaned, and the seed was sown (without any
manure) about the first week in October. After the wheat came up,
it was manured with a dusting of one hundredweight of guano, over
the entire field (about one acre, three roods), to keep the plants
alive through the winter. In the spring, being divided into three
portions, it was manured with the same number of experimental
manures, which were furnished to me by Mr. Blyth, of Church, near
Accrington, who also analyzed the soil and subsoil for me. These
manures were applied about the 10th of April, and the experiment
was still further varied by covering a portion of each division
with guano a fortnight afterwards, at the rate of two hundredweight
to the acre, but all the manure applied to the crop, including the
hundredweight of guano put on in the autumn, did not exceed 6 1/2
hundredweight. The crop, which was a very thin one in the spring,
improved so much by the application of