106 QUARTERLY JOURNAL. 



this process to take place, the presence of oxygen is necessary. 

 Now, seeds buried deep in the ground, or even at a slight depth, and 

 surrounded by compact earth, cannot grow. This is always found 

 to be the case in ploughing land that has been laid down to grass. 

 New kinds of plants will start up in abundance, and seeds, no 

 doubt, may lie buried in the soil for many years in an inactive state, 

 merely for the want of air. 



There are numerous other benefits arising from ploughing. It 

 drains the surface of superfluous water, and on the other hand 

 counteracts the effects of drought, by assisting the moisture to as- 

 cend from below. If done in the fall, it kills the larv8e of insects, 

 which have been laid in the ground to winter, and also buries the 

 seeds of many weeds too deep to germinate. 



But ploughing as done in this country, is only turning over the 

 surface. Deep ploughing is rarely practised. And we have often 

 heard men mistake it for suhsoiling. But the latter process consists 

 only in stirring up the subsoil with a plough constructed for the 

 purpose, without bringing any of it to the surface ; whereas in 

 deep ploughing the lower portions of the soil are all brought to the 

 surface, or mixed with the surface soil. There are benefits result- 

 ing from this when practised right. 



It is a fact, perfectly plain to any one, that the rain falling upon 

 the soil and passing through it, must, gradually at least, dissolve 

 all the soluble substances it meets with, and carry them down to a 

 greater or less depth into the earth. And not these only, but those 

 substances which are not already soluble, but which are in a finely 

 divided state, will be washed down in the same manner. We may 

 suppose that, in this way alone, a surface soil, when nothing is 

 applied, may from year to year be drained of its most valuable 

 parts, and at the same time an accumulation of them take place at 

 a depth below what the plough ordinarily reaches. Under these 

 circumstances, the under soil will contain the elements of great 

 fertility, whilst the surface soil may be very unproductive. It 

 will readily occur to any one, that in such a case the proper course 

 will be to plough deep — to turn up this under soil and make it the 

 top soil. This is undoubtedly true. The fact is, that the plough 

 is very rarely carried to any considerable depth — from four to six 

 inches being probably as deep as almost any farmer ploughs. 

 Hence the soil below this will be constantly becoming richer, 



