COMPOSITION OF SOILS AND THEIR ACTION. 51 



management. Cultivation is here so young, that, 

 had it been of the worst description, it would scarce- 

 ly have been possible so soon to exhaust the treas- 

 ures that have for centuries been accumulating in 

 our soils. Still there are examples in the United 

 States where soils have nearly reached that point 

 from which a restoration to fertihty is impractica- 

 ble. Soils of a silicious nature, or that are inclining 

 to sand, are the most easily and quickly reduced. 

 Of this the southeast part of Massachusetts, and 

 parts of the Southern States at the present time, 

 and parts of Long Island as they were some thirty 

 years ago, furnish striking proof. When cultivated 

 without regard to consequences, the nutritive part 

 of such soils is quickly exhausted ; the little vegeta- 

 tion produced is not sufficient to prevent the burning 

 effect of the sun ; the roots of the grasses are una- 

 ble to fix and bind the soil ; it becomes loose and 

 floating ; plants root themselves with more and more 

 difficulty ; and at last, what was once a fertile plain 

 becomes a sandy waste, where cultivation is impos- 

 sible. 



It is in the Old World that this process of deterio- 

 ration may be the most clearly traced. To renovate 

 seems to have formed no part of the ancient profes- 

 sion of agriculture. In all the writings of antiquity, 

 there is scarcely a hint that manuring, or improving 

 cultivated lands in any way, was practised to any 

 extent. Now and then, where nature had set the 

 example of imparting fertility by the annual over- 

 flow of rivers, man seemed inclined so far to imitate 

 her works, and irrigation for ameliorating land was 

 frequently adopted. But this was about the extent 

 of ancient attempts at improved cultivation, and the 

 result has been such as might confidently have been 

 predicted. The regions of the East, that, two or 

 three thousand years since, were as the Garden of 

 Eden for beauty and fertility, have gradually become 

 steri] and worthless ; and tracts of country that once 



