No. 144.] 297 



sence of moisture from the immediate surface, as in drouth we 

 may, of all soils not properly prepared, we naturally inquire where 

 the water is, and conclude that the moisture is in the atmosphere. 

 All this we readily recognize by noticing the condensation on the 

 cold surfaces. While the ground is thoroughly dry, the north 

 side of a stone wall early in the morning is wet. How are we to 

 cause the soil to represent the cold object '? Wherever soils are 

 disintegrated to a sufficient depth, they will be found to be colder 

 than the supernatant atmosphere, and hence, when air circulates 

 in a free soil, it will deposit moisture on every particle of earth 

 colder than itself. It is for this reason that thoroughly under- 

 drained and subsoiled lands never suffer from drouth. Water 

 condensed from an atmosphere through which rain has not passed 

 for a long time, is highly charged with the fertilizing gases. Du- 

 ring drouth, the air being more highly charged with ammonia 

 than at other times, plants growing in deeply disintegrated soils, 

 frequently stirred, grow with unabated vigor during a long drouth. 

 That not one plant could be found which had suffered from drouth 

 on my farm is distinctly due to the fact that the whole is under- 

 drained and subsoil plowed, and the surface kept well stirred. 

 All shallow plowed land in my neighborhood and elsewhere, 

 has witnessed a material deterioration in the amount of crops, 

 while in all cases where the subsoil plow has been freely used, 

 the drouth has not injured the products to any observable extent. 

 The same preparation which will secure land against drouth will 

 protect the crops from the ill effects of too much rain. 



Mr. H. C. Vail said that Mr. Flood, of Patterson, subsoiled this 

 season a portion of a field, all treated otherwise alike; upon the 

 subsoiled portion the crops were good, while upon the other part 

 they were almost worthless. 



Mr. Meigs remarked that the theory of deep tillage relative to 

 drouth, was illustrated by decomposed sand stone. At Nyack, 

 the residence of the Hon. Hugh Maxwell, the free stone quarries 

 contain large amounts of rotten or decomposed stone called kellis, 

 which has proved to be very fertile. Now while this stone 

 remains solid, moisture can hardly penetrate it, and like some 

 hard soils, unfit for cultivation. The decomposed rocks form the 



