52 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



into powder, and mixed up with vegetable or animal matter. 

 Hence we might expect that they would differ in composition 

 as the rocks differ, and so they do ; though such has been the 

 nature of the agency by which the rocks were crumbled down, 

 that the materials from several rocks are frequently mingled 

 together. But in fact, rocks do not differ very materially in 

 composition. Some, such as trap rock and limestone, contain 

 more lime and magnesia than others. But there is scarcely 

 any rock of much extent, that does not contain all the earthly 

 ingredients essential to plants ; and therefore, so far as their 

 composition is concerned, it is comparatively unimportant from 

 what rock a soil is derived. We shall be almost sure to find in 

 it a large amount of silex, more or less of alumina, lime and 

 magnesia, with gypsum and phosphate of lime. 



But the great difference in the fertility of .soils depends more 

 upon the amount and condition of the organic matter which 

 they contain, and upon their power of absorbing and retaining 

 heat and moisture, and upon their degree of fineness or coarse- 

 ness, than upon their mineral constitution. Every farmer 

 knows that a soil may be too coarse or too fine for good crops, 

 and that it may Ijc too cold ; and also that it may al)Ound in 

 organic matter, — that is, such as results from decayed animals 

 and vegetables, — and yet be very barren. And when ashes, or 

 quick lime, or marl, or gypsum, or bone powder is added, they 

 render the soil fertile, not because the soil is entirely destitute 

 of these materials, but because they bring the vegetable matter 

 into such a state that it can be taken up by the roots of plants ; 

 or they make it mellow, or more tenacious of heat or moisture. 



If these views are correct, some important consequences 

 follow. 



One is, that there is scarcely any soil too barren to be made 

 very fertile ; and that what the farmers of New England should 

 aim at, is, not to transplant their sons to the fertile prairies of 

 the West, but to improve our own soil, so that they shall be 

 contented with the paternal inheritance. To illustrate this 

 position, let me give an example from my own experience. 

 Every, one knows that there is not a more barren spot in New 

 England, than the further extremity of Cape Cod ; where the 

 traveller sees little else but white drifting sand, and scarcely no 

 vegetation, except a few stinted pines, and beach, and poverty 



