western side, however, there prevails a tolerably broad belt of 

 much more fertile land, extending from the northern half of 

 Monmouth county, where it is widest, regularly diminishing in 

 breadth, in a southwest direction, to Salem. Its northwestern 

 margin ranges parallel with the Delaware river and the railroad 

 from Bordentown to South Amboy, keeping generally within 

 from three to six miles of them. This highly favoured tract, 

 which is denominated the " Marl Region," and which will be 

 minutely described in the following pages, resembles the rest of 

 the district very closely as to its general topographical features, 

 but offers a striking contrast in point of agricultural productive- 

 ness. Its soil, which usually possesses a more or less proportion 

 of the subjacent " marl" or green sand in its composition — 

 deriving hence its superiority — belongs principally to the two 

 varieties denominated by farmers sandy loam and loamy sand. 



The northern half of the State, or all that portion of it which 

 lies north of the line connecting the Delaware and Raritan, at 

 points respectively a little below Trenton and New Brunswick, 

 exhibits to the eye of the traveller a scenery wholly different 

 from that of the more monotonous tracts of the southern division 

 just described — possessing a surface at once diversified and 

 picturesque. When we view the several districts included within 

 this interesting and varied region, whether in reference to their 

 distinctive physical features, their particular mineral productions 

 and geological structure, or their characteristic soils, we find the 

 whole susceptible of a natural subdivision into three well-marked 

 tracts. 



The first of these, or that upon the southeast, comprises nearly 

 one half of the whole area of the northern half of the State, 

 which it crosses in a northeast and southwest direction, from the 

 Delaware river to the New York state line, having a length of 

 about seventy miles. Its southeastern limit is formed in part by 

 the line already mentioned as extending from Trenton to New 

 Brunswick, in part by Staten Island Sound, connecting the 

 Raritan and New York bays, and in part by the Hudson river. 



Its northwestern edge coincides with the base of the range of 

 hills denominated in New York and in this State, the Highlands. 

 This boundary follows the foot of the chain from the New York 

 state line in a southwest direction to the Delaware river, coin- 



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