FARMERS' REGISTER— CALCAREOUS SOILS OF ALABAMA. 



277 



see the impression of the surfaces of the shells. It 

 grows harder liy dry exposure, but it is not very 

 good for building. It absorbs much water and 

 scales by freezing. With sufficient heat, it turns 

 to lime, which is good for building, but is too 

 coarse and dark for plastering. The best lime 

 is made from that which has been exposed perhaps 

 for ages to the action of the sun and air; and that 

 kind presents itself in various places, and in large 

 tracts, exhibiting a very singular, craggy apjicar- 

 ance, resembling large bones of animals, and other 

 grotesque ' shapes. H. 



[We received by the same mail the letter from which 

 the foregoing extract is taken, and the Southern Agri- 

 culturist containing the article that will be next presen- 

 ted. Both these communications add confirmation to a 

 doctrine which we have before presented to our readers, 

 in the " Supplementary Chapter to the Essay on Calca- 

 reous Manures," (No. 2 of Farmers' Register.) What 

 the writer there maintained as deductions from the che- 

 mical properties of calcareous earth, sustained by a few 

 experiments and observations, have attracted the atten- 

 tion of several of our correspondents who are able to 

 bring the far better proof of many and well known facts. 

 The foregoing connnunication is most full on this sub- 

 ject, and therefore is most satisfactory. The selected 

 article on the "Southern Prairies," in addition to its ge- 

 neral interest and value, confirms the opinions of our 

 several correspondents, without its author knowing, and 

 therefore having no partiality for the theoretical views 

 which his facts so well sustain. But for the power which 

 calcareous earth possesses of coml)ining with putrescent 

 matter, it can scarcely be doubted that this healthy re- 

 gion would be very diflferent. A soil impenetrable to 

 the rains of winter — rank and putrefying herbage, and 

 the decaying trees of new settlements — bad water, and a 

 hot climate — all would surely combine to make the coun- 

 try unhealthy, but for the safeguard furnished by its re- 

 markable soil. 



The statements of our correspondent H. serve to 

 throw light on other peculiarities of the prairie lands. 

 The remarkable absence of trees on the prairies has never 

 been satisfactorily explained. No doubt the cause is not 

 always the same, the soils being far from uniform. But 

 the " bald prairies," here described, are evidently exces- 

 sively calcareous, and for that reason, less friendly to the 

 growth of timber, than of particular kinds of grasses. 

 Lands containing only a moderate proportion of calca- 

 reous matter, when once well cleared of roots by til- 

 lage, are less subject to throw up a new growth of trees, 

 tha)i our acid and steril soils. 



We agree entirely with the opinion of our correspon- 

 dent of the great value of these calcareous soils. But 

 the wonderful power which they possess ought to be ju- 

 diciously directed, or it may do harm instead of good. 

 These soils want vegetable matter, and that alone is 

 wanting to make the " bald prairies," as fertile as their 

 outskirts, which differ only in being less calcareous. A 

 soil so calcareous as to be unfit to sujjport most plants, 

 is the belter suited for all of the clover and pea tribes, 

 which may therefore be most advantageously used for 

 their improvement. Sanfoin, which grows well on the 

 almost pure chalks of EurojDC, and which cannot live in 

 Virginia, for want of a like soil, may (if climate does not 

 forbid) be equally well nourished by the soft limestone of 



Alabama. But if these super-calcareous lands are cul- 

 tivated incessantly until their vegetable matter (already 

 deficient) is exhausted, they will be as sterile, as "lousy" 

 Champagne in France, or the desert plains of Egypt ; 

 looth of these soils being like the bald prairies of Ala- 

 Ijama, composed principally of calcareous earth. 



However, these speculations are useless, and to the 

 Alabama planter it may appear even ridiculous, to re- 

 commend means for Increasing, or even preserving the 

 fertility of his now productive lands. This considei-a- 

 tion has before restrained the expression of this opinion, 

 (when before we presented the views of another corres- 

 pondent from Alabama,) that that country needs theap- 

 pheation of the knowledge of calcareous manuies, as 

 much as it posse.sses the abundant means for that appli- 

 cation. — [Ed. Far, Heg, 



From the Southern Agriculturist. 

 ON THE ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES 

 OF LOCATING A PLANTING INTEREST IN THE 

 SOUTHWESTERN PRAIRIES. 



Dear Sir, — To your inquirj^ about the Prairies 

 of the West, and the prospect of a cotton planting 

 interest being located on them advantageously, I 

 reply willingly as to any supposed trouble it may 

 give ; my reluctance has arisen, irom not being 

 sufficiently acquainted with the country, to speak 

 with the confidence of correctness that ought to 

 make it a guide for any one. I have only seen the 

 Prairies of Alabama, in the counties of Montgo- 

 mery and Lowndes, and have tried to ascertain the 

 composition of the soil, and the effects produced on 

 it by heat, drought, and moisture, so far as con- 

 nected w ith their productions. The Prairies mean 

 the lime lands, and cover a large portion of the 

 surfiice of the middle parts of that State, and are 

 divided into the wooded and bald, (or unwooded 

 Prairie which are so interspersed, that in one thou- 

 sand acres together of the most wooded, there will 

 be from one-third to one-fillh of bald Prairie, and 

 and in the most bald, a similar proportion of wood- 

 ed Prairie. To speak generally, the Prairies are 

 healthy, high, dry, and very undulating, present- 

 ing but few levels and no savannahs ; the hills bald 

 or unwooded, and covered with a dense growth of 

 grass and weeds, furnishing coarse but excellent 

 pasturage ; the sides of the hills, lieginning at about 

 one half of their declivities, with the intervening 

 valleys (there called skies) wooded, with the soil 

 of jet black color, which sometimes extends over 

 the whole hill, though very often the bald parts 

 are the color of lime ; the crown of many of the 

 hills to the space of half an acre, covered with the 

 pure lime rock in lumps, which, on calcination, 

 makes excellent lime, and in great abundance. 

 The sides of the hills and slues are very properly 

 considered the best lands as to fertility, durable- 

 ness and exemption from rust. The black soil, 

 and that growth which shows rich land here, is 

 considered the best, and the close or stiff soils, if 

 such a term can ])ro].erly be applied to lands so 

 very loose, are to be preferred as being more cer- 

 tainly free from the rust, a disease to which cotton is 

 very liable in the bald, and in some kinds of the 

 wooded Prairie, after long use. 



There are also some Prairie swamps, or levels 

 of considerable width, very rich indeed, and very 

 closely covered with a dense growth of canes, 

 (much of them more than thirty feet high) and a 



