Page:Willich, A. F. M. - The Domestic Encyclopædia (Vol. 2, 1802).djvu/452

420&#93; 420] GYP been advantageously employed for fertilizing the soil; and various ex- periments have been made by dif- ferent agriculturists, to ascertain its efficacy. From these, it appears to be a most valuable manure ; and a correspondent in the 5 th volume pf the " Letters of the Bath and West of England Society," states, that he covered a piece of grass- land two inches thick, with barn- manure ; while, on another part of the same exhausted land, he scattered gypsum or plaster of Paris, in order to compare its ef- fects with those of the dung. Both spots were mowed twice in the same year, and once in the suc- ceeding : in every crop the land covered with gypsum was more productive. — The effects of the lat- ter manure on cabbages and tur- nips were equally beneficial ; and particularly uplands, which were completely exhausted, and aban- doned on account of their sandy na- ture, have thus been rendered fer- tile. These experiments have been conducted on a very extensive plan in the United States of America, especially in Pennsylvania 3 where two crops of grass were annually cut from sandy heights, the first of which yielded upon an average two tons per acre, and the latter, one ; nor has this produce decreas- ed after a succession of six years. In the same State, an old wheat- field was manured with gypsum about ten days after the harvest ; in the ensuing March it was sown with clover ; and early in Septem- ber more than tvo tons of rich clover were obtained from each acre. Nine additional bushels of corn per acre were, likewise, pro* I in that country by a similar ireatnx nt of the soil. Although the numerous expert" GYP ments made in' Britain hare Oof succeeded in every instance, yet the superiority of gypsum over every other manure, for chalky and dry calcareous lands, has been clearly evinced. In the year 17[)1, Mr. Arthur Young scattered on a field of good turnip loam* with a gravelly bot- tom, at the rate of five bushels of gypsum per acre, part of which was afterwards sown with clover, and the rest with wheat. The en- suing summer was uncommonly dry ; and, though both the wheat and clover were eventually burnt up, yet previous to the drought, die latter was not only considerably higher, but also thicker, of a deeper, and far more luxuriant colour, and of a broader leaf than any other clover that had not been thus ma- nured. No alteration, however, was discernible in the wheat. Mr. Young concludes his account (" Annals of Agriculture" vol. 16) with observing, that neither a si- milar quantity of night-soil, pigeon s' dung, peat-ashes, nor any other substance with which he is ac- quainted, would have had an equal effect.. In the 17th vol. of the work last quoted, there is an account ex- tracted from a provincial paper, concerning the clleets of gypsum j from which it appears that, if oats be immersed in water, drained, and then gradually mixed with plaster of Paris, till the former w< ru sufficiently dry to be sown evenly, the produce of such prepared oats will be much finer, and far more luxuriant, than from unprepared seed. One bushel of gypsum only was mixed with eight of oats, from which were produced 122 bushels, while 96 only were obtained from Ml equal quantity without any pre- vious