A True Recipe

ashes, which the saltpeter-makers use, and similarly with those that serve for lye: and this is why they are subsequently useless, which is the point that must make you believe what I have said from the beginning: that is to know, that the waters which pass through the manures carry away all the salt and render the manure useless, which is an ignorance of very great weight. And if it were corrected, one would not know how to estimate how great the profit would be. I wish that everyone who will see this secret would be as careful to keep it as it deserves.

Tell me, how then could I avoid ruining my manure?

If you want your manure to serve you fully and to the utmost, you must dig a pit in some suitable place, near your stables. And this pit, dug in the manner of a trough or a watering place, you must pave said trough or pit with pebbles, or stones, or brick. And, having paved it well with mortar of lime and sand, you will carry your manures to keep in the said pit until the time when it must be carried to the fields. And so that the said manure is not spoiled by the rains or by the sun, you will make some kind of shelter to cover the said manure. And when the time of sowing comes, you will carry the said manure into the field with all its substance, and you will find that the paving of the pit, or receptacle, will have kept all the liquid of the manure, which otherwise would have been lost, and the earth would have sucked up part of the substance of the said manure. And you must note here that if at the bottom of the pit or receptacle of said manure there is found some clear matter that has descended from the manures, and that the said matter cannot be carried in baskets, you must take casks that can hold water, as if you wanted to carry the vintage, and then you will carry the said clear matter, be it urine of beasts or whatever you want. I assure you that it is the best part of the manure, indeed the most salty: and if you do it thus, you will return to the earth the same thing that had been taken from it by the growth of the seeds, and the seeds that you will put there