15G How CHOPS FKED, 



vegetable matter in bogs and marshes. A soil is peaty or 

 mucky wlien containing vegetable remains that have suf- 

 fered partial decay under water. 



Vegetable Mold is a soil containing much organic mat- 

 ter that has decayed without submergence in water, either 

 resulting from the leaves, etc., of forest trees, from the 

 roots of grasses, or from the frequent application of large 

 doses of strawy manures. 



Ochcry or Ferruginous Soils are those containing much 

 oxide or silicates of iron ; they have a yellow, red, or 

 brown color. 



Other divisions are current among practical men, as, 

 for example, surface and subsoil, active and inert soil, 

 tilth, and hard pan. These terms mostly explain them- 

 selves. When, at the depth of four inches to one foot or 

 more, the soil assumes a different color and texture, these 

 distinctions have meaning. 



The surface soil, active soil, or tilth, is the portion that 

 is wrought by the instruments of tillage — that which is 

 moistened by the rains, warmed by the sun, permeated by 

 the atmosphere, in which the plant extends its roots, gath- 

 ers its soil-food, and which, by the decay of the subter- 

 ranean organs of vegetation, acquires a content of humus. 



Subsoil. — Where the soil originally had the same char- 

 acters to a great depth, it often becomes modified down 

 to a certain point, by the agencies just enumerated, in 

 such a manner that the eye at once makes the distinction 

 into surface soil and subsoil. In many cases, however, 

 such distinctions are entirely arbitrary, the earth changing 

 its appearance gradually or even remaining uniform to a 

 considerable depth. Again, the surface soil may have a 

 greater downward extent than the active soil, or the tilth 

 may extend into the subsoil. 



Hard pan is the appropriate name of a dense, almost 

 impenetrable, crust or stratum of ochery clay or com- 



