“Perhaps not,” said my father, “but we have got to do something for the land, or the crops will be poor, and poor crops do not pay these times. What would you use instead of lime?” --“Lime is not a manure, strictly speaking,” said I; “a bushel to the acre would furnish all the lime the crops require, even if there was not an abundant supply already in the soil. If you mix lime with guano, it sets free the ammonia; and when you mix lime with the soil it probably decomposes some compounds containing ammonia or the elements of ammonia, and thus furnishes a supply of ammonia for the plants. I think it would be cheaper to buy ammonia in the shape of Peruvian guano.” After dinner, my father asked me to take a walk over the farm. We came to a field of barley. Standing at one end of the field, about the middle, he asked me if I could see any difference in the crop. “Oh, yes,” I replied, “the barley on the right-hand is far better than on the left hand. The straw is stiffer and brighter, and the heads larger and heavier. I should think the right half of the field will be ten bushels per acre better than the other.” “So I think,” he said, “and now can you tell me why?” --“Probably you manured one half the field for turnips, and not the other half.” --“No.” --“You may have drawn off the turnips from half the field, and fed them off by sheep on the other half.” --“No, both sides were treated precisely alike.” --I gave it up --“Well,” said he, “this half the field on the right-hand was limed, thirty years ago, and that is the only reason I know for the difference. And now you need not tell me that lime does not pay.” I can well understand how this might happen. The system of rotation adopted was, 1st clover, 2d wheat, 3d turnips, 4th barley, seeded with clover. Now, you put on, say 150 bushels of lime for wheat. After the wheat the land is manured and sown with turnips. The turnips are eaten off on the land by sheep; and it is reasonable to suppose that on the half of the field dressed with lime there would be a much heavier crop of turnips. These turnips being eaten off by the sheep would furnish more manure for this half than the other half. Then again, when the land was in grass or clover, the limed half would afford more and sweeter grass and clover than the other half, and the sheep would remain on it longer. They would eat it close into the ground, going only on to the other half when they could not get enough to eat on the limed half. More of their droppings would be left on the limed half of the field. The lime, too, would continue to act for several years; but even after all direct benefit from the lime had ceased, it is easy to understand why the crops might be better for a long period of time.