NATURE OF SWAMP-:MUCK. 129 



The name " peat " better clistinguislies the deposits in most 

 bogs and meadows, but is not applicable to those of frog- 

 ponds and larger basins of water. If- the meaning of the word 

 "muck" could be restricted to that class of wet-meadow 

 products in which the natural alteration of plant-tissues had 

 proceeded far enough to fit them for agricultural uses, it 

 would be a convenience, and remove some confusion which 

 now exists among chemists and farmers. It is not difficult 

 to describe the deposits or their physical peculiarities so as 

 to make a clear distinction between what might be called 

 "peat" and muck ; and in this discussion I will endeavor to 

 point out the distinction. 



ORIGIN OF MUCK DEPOSITS. 



The origin of the deposits under consideration is not by 

 any means obscure, and may be stated in a few words. 

 Wherever stagnant water has existed in low basins for a 

 large number of years, a certain class of marsh plants, 

 mosses, and grasses have found favoring conditions for rapid 

 and luxuriant growth. These plants have matured and 

 decayed, finding a tomb in the impure waters which fostered 

 their growth. As the decades of years and of centuiies 

 succeeded, with the alternations of heat and cold, the basins 

 were filled up ; so that surface-water disappeared, and matted 

 turf, compacted with low and worthless forms of grasses, 

 came into view. In most cases deciduous trees and water- 

 shrubs grew in association with the grasses and mosses ; and. 

 the annual fall of leaves and dead twigs contributed not a. 

 little to filling up the stagnant ponds and puddles. 



Whenever vegetable growths become dead, and fall into- 

 moist earth with access of air, a process of eremacausis, or- 

 slow combustion, commences, which, proceeding slowly, ulti- 

 mately ends in entire disorganization of tissue ; and the prod- 

 uct is called " humus." The process is different when it falls 

 into the water ; as, in the case of large trees and limbs, a 

 dozen centuries will hardl}^ serve to disassociate and change 

 their cellular structure, and some of the finest and most 

 durable timber used in ship and house construction lias been, 

 exhumed from the vast swamps and bogs found in our own 

 and other countries. The peats and mucks of our own low 

 meadows have, to a large extent, resulted from the decay 



