159 



SECTION VI. 



PREPARATION OF THE SOIL FOR OPEN DISPOSITIONS OF 

 TREES AND CLOSE PLANTATIONS. 



Having sufficiently illustrated the New Theory suggested 

 for Transplantation, the first branch of practice, that claims 

 attention, is the Preparation of the Soil. 



The substances which constitute Soils, as Sir H. Davy 

 states, are certain compounds of the earths, silica, lime, 

 alumina, magnesia, and of oxides of iron and manganesum ; 

 also animal and vegetable matters in a decomposing state ; 

 and saline, acid, or alkaline combinations.* Soils afford to 

 plants a fixed abode, and the medium only of their nourish- 

 ment. Earths, exclusively of organized matter and water, 

 as the best phytologists admit, are of no other use to woody 

 plants, than to fix them in the ground, and support them : 

 they act merely as mechanical, or as chemical agents : but 

 earth and organic matter united constitute what is properly 

 called Soils, and furnish to plants at once support and nour- 

 ishment. The true food of plants, as the same instructive 

 writer observes, is water and decomposing organic matter. 

 The earthy particles are useful in retaining the water, so as to 

 supply it in due proportions to the roots of vegetables ; and 

 they likewise act, in producing a proper distribution of the 

 animal or vegetable matter. When equally mixed with it, 



* Elements of Agricultural Chemistry. 



