STATK IIORTK'I LTl RAL SOCIETY. 85 



Mississippi bluffs, in the soutlicrn part of the State, these concretions are 

 quite numerous, and are locally called " petrified potatoes." The Loess 

 gives origin to the round-topped, grass-covered hills, nearly or quite desti- 

 tute of trees, that form a marked and pleasing feature in the scenery of our 

 river bluffs ; and though most conspicuous along our rivers, this deposit also 

 extends in local patches into the interior of the State, and underlays the 

 city of Springfield and a considerable area adjacent thereto. Oftentimes 

 we find it overlaid by two or three feet of finely comminuted brown clay, 

 precisely like that forming the subsoil of the prairies, and probably formed 

 in the same way. The Loess itself is no doubt a sedimentary deposit 

 that accumulated in the lakes that once filled the river valleys, and also 

 extended over large areas away from them ; and this also occurred 

 during that period of emergence of which I have already spoken, and 

 immediately anterior to the formation of the prairie subsoil. A casual 

 examination of the Loess would lead any one to believe that it containeii 

 little else but fine sand, though a chemical analysis shows its composition 

 to be about as follows: sand, 82 to 85 per cent.; carbonate of lime, 

 7 to 10 per cent.; oxide of iron, 3 to 5 per cent., with 2 or 3 

 per cent, of alumina, magnesia and organic matter. Locally, it contains 

 a good many land and fresh water shells, and the carbonate of lime that it 

 contains may be due to their presence and decomposition. It gives origin 

 to a light, porous, free-draining soil, that is perhaps the best fruit soil 

 in the State, and also well adapted to wheat and clover. A very large 

 proportion of the vineyards in this State, so far as my observations have 

 extended, are planted upon this soil ; and the apple orchards located 

 upon it are, in my opinion, as a general rule, more productive and yield 

 a fairer and better quality of fruit than those planted upon the best 

 prairie soils. It is quite probable, however, that some of the eminent 

 horticulturists present are far better qualified to speak authoritively upon 

 this subject than myself, inasmuch as your attention has been more 

 especially directed to it. 



In Great Britain, according to Dr. Ramsey, the able director of the 

 Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, the best fruit soils are those 

 derived from the red rocks; and as this coloring matter is usually, if not 

 always the oxide of iron, it seems probable that its presence in notable 

 quantity is one of the essential elements in a good fruit soil, and to this 

 the Loess may owe, in part, its excellence as a fruit soil, as it is shown to 

 contain from three to five per cent, of the oxide of iron. In speaking of 

 the fruit soils of Great Britain, Dr. Ramsey says: "It is worthy of notice 

 that the fruit districts of Great Britain lie chiefly upon the red rocks, some- 

 times of the old and sometimes of the new red series. The counties of 

 Devonshire, Herefordshire and Gloucestershire, with their numerous 

 orchards, celebrated for their cider and perry, lie in great part on these 

 formations, where all the fields and hedge rows are, in spring, white with 

 the blossoms of innumerable fruit trees. Again, in Scotland, the plain 

 called the Carse of Gowrie, lying between the Sidlaw hills and the 

 Frith of Tay, stretches over a tract of old red sandstone, and is famous 

 for it sapples. What may be the reason of this relation I do not know, 



