matter under the surface, my treatment of sandy ground would be the
reverse of that described for clay. Before using the product of the
horse-stable, I would compost it with at least an equal bulk of
leaves, muck, sods, or even plain earth if nothing better could be
found. A compost of stable manure with clay would be most excellent.
If possible, I would not use any manure on light ground until all
fermentation was over, and then I would rather _harrow_ than plow
it in. This will leave it near the surface, and the rains will leach
it down to the roots--and below them, also--only too soon. Fertility
cannot be stored up in sand as in clay, and it should be our aim to
give our strawberries the food they need in a form that permits of its
immediate use. Therefore, in preparing such land, I would advise deep
plowing while it is moist, if possible, soon after a rain; then the
harrowing in of a liberal top-dressing of rotted compost, or of muck
sweetened by the action of frost and the fermentation of manure, or,
best of all, the product of the cow-stable. Decayed leaves, sods, and
wood-ashes also make excellent fertilizers.

In the garden, light soils can be given a much more stable and
productive character by covering them with clay to the depth of one or
two inches every fall, and then plowing it in. The winter's frost and
rains mix the two diverse soils, to their mutual benefit. Carting sand
on clay is rarely remunerative; the reverse is decidedly so, and top-
dressings of clay on light land are often more beneficial than equal
amounts of manure.

As practically employed, I regard quick, stimulating manures, like
aguno, very injurious to light soils. I believe them to be the curse
of the South. They are used "to make a crop," as it is termed; and
they do make it for a few years, but to the utter impoverishment of