128 MISSOURI STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



NEXT IN ALTITUDE 



Above the Drift comes the Loess, a formation quite different from- 

 any other on this continent; made under peculiar circumstances; 

 brought together by the many currents that from three-fourths of a 

 million square miles met together and pooled their vast variety of 

 material under the waters of the greatest of lakes. If you would know 

 from whence all this was brought, spread before you a map of all the 

 expanse drained by the Missouri river. Trace each river and rivulet,, 

 each brook and rill to their sources. Go upon the mountain sides and 

 see the torrents, and on and up till you have found the places where 

 the water trickles from the eternal snows; aye, and still on and up 

 to where the cold endures forever, to where the fiercest storms of earth 

 beat on the cliffs,and the avalanche crushes everything from its path,, 

 and all is tending down, always downward. When you have compre- 

 hended the size of the area drained, when you have somewhat acquainted 

 yourself with the geology of that vast region, when you reason on the 

 mechanical forces that have ground out and moved their products here,, 

 then may you understand how the upper story of Holt county was 

 made. When we understand the chemistry of its materials, we shall 

 know why this is "the best of all soils." 



The loess, many feet in thickness, forms the upper part of all the 

 high country of Holt county. Among the hills it is more or less pure r 

 but on the high prairie it is much mixed, especially near the surface, 

 with other material. 



The loess is a marl — it is mostly from limestone ground to an almost 

 impalpable powder, mechanically mixed with other constituents, and 

 chemically combined with other materials for a first-class soil, while its 

 great depth makes it inexhaustible. Dirt brought up from many feet 

 below the surface soon produces well. 



Mechanically the loess is quite peculiar. Wells are often left un- 

 walled. Cuts on roads are made perpendicular, or nearly so. Many 

 cellars and caves are without walls, and are never troubled with water 

 rising or coming through the soil into them. Roots of trees and all 

 vegetations penetrate it to an unusual depth. 



The cliffs of the older rocks in many places have been worn away, 

 and the loess sliding or washing from above has mingled with their 

 particles, forming the soil of our creek bottoms, and of much of our 

 slope land. This process of disintegration and mixing is what gives 

 the hill country such endless variety to its soil, even when the loess is- 

 very much the larger element. 



