34 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



great extent shall be dyked against the tide, and the power of 

 steam applied to its effectual drainage, the obtaining of a soil of 

 the richest description, so near to some of the best markets in 

 the country, will be likely to afford an ample compensation for 

 any expense which may be incurred. It may be said that such 

 improvements must be very distant in a country where immense 

 tracts of unoccupied land, of the richest description, remain to be 

 had at very low prices; but the proximity to a great city, and to 

 several large and thickly inhabited towns, continually increas 

 ing, in population, business, and wealth, with almost unparalleled 

 rapidity, must give a value to such lands which can scarcely be 

 calculated, and keep far in advance of the competition of even 

 the most fertile lands in a remote interior. Indeed, a slight 

 inquiry will satisfy any one that the value of lands in the 

 neighborhood of our cities, for agricultural and horticultural pur 

 poses, in spite of all the predictions founded on the improved 

 and unlooked-for modes of conveyance by canals and railroads, 

 has been continually rising, and has by no means reached the 

 zenith. 



Three difficulties may be said to present themselves in the 

 redemption and improvement of all peat lands ; the first is their 

 wetness, and draining must be the first operation to be applied 

 to them ; the second is their want of compactness, for they are 

 often too light and spongy for the growth of plants, though this 

 defect will be partially remedied by the draining of them ; and 

 the third is the removal of some pernicious quality, some min 

 eral acid, which is prejudicial to the growth of the best vegeta 

 tion, or the supply of some element of vegetation which is 

 requisite in the cultivation of any other plants than that of which 

 the moss itself is formed. Peat, though wholly a vegetable sub 

 stance, and, properly speaking, a compact mass of humus, in 

 itself furnishing, under a proper form of preparation, a useful ma 

 nure, is still deficient in the elements necessary for the growth 

 of the finer grasses, the esculent vegetables, and the cereal 

 grains.* What, in particular, these elements are, remains for 



* Professor Kane, in his instructive work on the Industrial Resources of Ire 

 land, remarks, that &quot; it is by the gradual formation and decomposition of this body 

 (nitrogen) that the organic matter of the soil becomes so powerful an agent in its 

 fertilization. The roots and fibres of a crop, left in the soil, gradually rot, and 

 become thereby the means of absorbing from the atmosphere a quantity of nitro- 



