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A Philosophical Discourse

Cat a square ot Oblong ‘Pitt of thirty or forty foot in length, at theleast four foot in depth, and ten foot over, or of what Dimensions orFigure you think will iuffice to furnish you with Store: Let one ofth eSides or Edges be made so Hoping, as to receive a Cart or Wheelbarrowto load and unload easily; let the Bottom and Sides also be so wepaV’d, or laid with a Bed of small Chalk, Clay, or the like, that 1may be capable of retaining Water like a Cistern : If to this you caneommodioufly direct any Channels or Gutters from your Stable, another Sinks about the Houle, it will be much the better. The Pitprepar’d, and under Covert (for that I should have premis’d) so as ^least the downright Rains may not fall upon it (but when you pl ea , reast into it, first, yortr Stable-soil with the Litter, a foot or more th* c >according to the Depth of your Pit ; upon this lay a Bed of fine Men 'on that another Bed of Cyder-Marc, rotten Fruit, and Gardenon this a Couch of Pigeons and Poultry-dung, with more Horse 'd^yLitter ; then a Stratum of Sheeps-dung, a Layer of Earth ag aI ^’then Neats-dung-, lastly, Ajhes, Soot, Fern, (amoist and a dry)torn of Wood-stack, Saw-dust, dry Scourings of Ponds and Pitfi 'with all other Ingredients, as you happen to amass them, till theC(Pbe full and heaped up: upon all this Cast plentiful Water from tust etime, which if you can have out of some Pond where Cattle uledrink and cool themselves in, it will be excellent. At the Expi*^ ^of two Years you may confidently open your Magazine, andthe Layers as they rile, to cast them into other small Pits ordes made a little concave to receive them; where you may st*b , lSmingle, and work them in with frefli Mould, or one with the otlWh ^you find cause, till they become comparatively sweet and agreeab ^the Scent. Lastly, you may pals them through a Screen h> a c ^Laths placed at moderate Intervals, and with the Liquor rernai* 1111 ^your great Cistern sprinkle the several Composts, and make the? 1for use, casting the coarse remaining Stuff, which would not P a

jui ujc, caning me coane remaining orun, wnicn wouia not y\ ^ ££ pRiddle , into the Cistern again for farther Mortification, and 1°your Pit filsd with fresh Materials from time to time after th e ‘Method: Others, in the mean time, lay their several Ingredss ^ csthemselves in some shady Corner, which being frequently stir*two or three Years, mingle them together at discretion. . t ;ll

There are some who advise us to suffer our Mixture to rcrnal ^ u ft,It be quite dry, after it is thus refin’d ; and then being beaten ^ ^to strew it Upon the Ground. And indeed this seems in Pliny s u jdto have been the Custom; nor do I contradict it, provided y oLl ^ £C p-water it, or were sure of a Shower before the Sun had drank t°° jtly of the Spirit and Vigor of it, which, redue’d in this mans 1 ’does easily part withal. .<

Now the Reason of our thus treating Composts of various So*Substances, is not only to dulcify, sweeten, and free them ^noxious Qualities they otherwise retain, and consequently imp al ’ply’d, as usually we find them, crude, indigested, and unacti^ ^ ^for being immoderately hot and burning, or else rank, and apt*- j llC egender Vermin, Weeds, and fungous Excrescences, than to P te fijlWhollbme Plants, Fruits, and Roots fit for the Table, anc &to the Palate; for which Effect, it should be throughly concocts, ^of a Scent agreeable, and redue’d to the next Disposition oand natural Earth, short and tractable, yet not so macerated a ^

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