landed proprietors to ascertain what is required, and they should take care to apply no more than is necessary.  This caution is most particularly needed in this neighbourhood, where lime is cheap, and where the opinion is prevalent that the more there is applied the better it is for the land, and where it is common to apply ten or twelve tons to the acre.  I have stated above that chemical manure was applied to a small portion of the field after the setting-in of the drought in April.  The action of this manure showed that a good thing may be very injurious if applied at an improper time; for, although it produced a stimulating effect on the plant immediately after its application, there was too little moisture in the land to dissolve it thoroughly, and thus enable the plants to appropriate it, until the rain came, about the end of June, when the wheat had been in flower some time; but the stimulus was then so great that all the plants threw up fresh stalks (from the roots), which were in flower when the wheat was cut, and it was then found that they had not only impoverished the plants, but had prevented the grain from ripening.  This was the case not only in the experimental field, but in several others also, where the chemical manure was sowed after the setting-in of the drought.  When the field was sowed with guano, it was thought desirable to cover one part of it with the African, and the other with Peruvian, for the sake of comparison; but as the African did not appear to produce the same stimulating effect as the other, fifty per cent. more was applied, that the cost might be equal (the Peruvian cost 10s., the African 7s. per cwt.); but as the latter application of the African was made when the wheat was just shooting into ear, the same objection applies to the experiment which does to the chemical manure applied after the drought had set in—­viz., that there was not sufficient moisture in the soil to dissolve it thoroughly until the plant was too far advanced to benefit by it; and therefore its failure would be no proof of the value of the African as compared with the Peruvian, which was the object of the experiment.  It is true, no bad effects followed the application similar to those produced by the misapplication of the chemical manure in dry weather, yet if soluble salts like the latter did not find sufficient moisture in the ground when applied in April, there is reason to suppose that the former would not do so when applied in May.  I regret the failure of the experiment without any manure, as I think the result would have shown satisfactorily that the land is so far from being impoverished by this system of cropping, that it is improving every year.  I think, however, that this is shown by the produce of the land manured with guano alone.  In the first year’s experiment the produce from guano alone was 27 bushels per acre, and both straw and wheat were very indifferent in quality.  This year the produce from guano alone is 42 1/3 bushels;