592 THE PHILOSOPHY OF FARMING. 
above has choked up the air passages. ‘Then the 
process requires to be renewed ; and this renewal 
is also attended with its advantages. A second 
filtration of particles of the soil into the subsoil, 
and the renewed action of the atmosphere within 
it tend to convert the whole into soil by mixing 
with it decaying animal and vegetable matter. 
Thus the extent of soil will ultimately be doubled. 
And husbandry of this kind not only secures 
profitable returns to the present cultivator, but 
benefits posterity by leaving to them increased 
capabilities within the soil ; so that while a farmer 
thus becomes his own benefactor, he becomes also 
the benefactor of all mankind. For he who, by 
skill and management, can make two bushels of 
grain grow on ground where his fore-elders could 
only grow one, and leave that ground in a condi- 
tion to continue the produce and increase it by a 
continuance of the management, may console 
himself with the thought that, whatever others 
may have been, he has not been useless in his 
day and generation. He may leave neither fame 
nor fortune behind him ; yet he bequeaths untold 
blessings to untold generations of his fellows who 
have to follow him to the end of time. 
The thinner and poorer the soil the greater the 
