Proceedings of the Farmer^ Club. 547 



increasing angles on rising from the sole of the plow upward, these 

 lines all starting in a segment of a circle, or an ellipse at the breast 

 or forward part of the plow." 



If the merits of public benefactors were to be estimated by the 

 amount of material comfort conferred, James Smith, of Deanston, 

 Scotland, the inventor of draining and subsoiling, would have few 

 peers. 



The subsoil plow, invented by him, is now known wherever we 

 have accounts of agricultural operations. It is very simple in 

 itself, and more simple and far more easy of draft than when he 

 left it. An inclined plane on one side, as he made it, being found 

 to add nothing to its efficiency, but greatly to its draft, has been 

 omitted. It is of the first and lowest grade of deep- working 

 implements, and when we call it deep-working, it must be under- 

 stood in a qualified meaning, for it is not intended, except in a 

 small degree, to prepare the subsoil for the reception of the roots 

 of plants. It follows in the furrow of a tillage plow, for the pur- 

 pose, first, of breaking up the indurated bed, that forms generally 

 just beneath the depth at which tillage plows have worked, during 

 whatever period the land may have been under cultivation, render- 

 ing it susceptible, in some degree, to ameliorating influences, and 

 enabling it to aflbrd some little assistance to the support of plants, 

 by the feeble entertainment of their roots. But the chief advantage 

 in these cases will be the gradual preparation that will fit the subsoil 

 to be brought to the surface at length, with the need of a smaller 

 degree of enrichment added than would otherwise be required; 

 second, to lower the water-table so that the roots of plants may 

 have the whole thickness of the fertile layer in healthful condition; 

 third, to open water-courses, that will act as a temporary substitute 

 for drainage; and fourth, for the special purpose for which it was 

 invented, to hasten the action of drains, by opening water-passages 

 down a considerable distance toward them. The idea sometimes 

 entertained, that subsoil plowing will greatly aid in the direct pre- 

 paration of ground for orchards and vineyards, is fallacious, often 

 leading to disappointment. The subsoil cannot be rendered health- 

 fully fertile, except by being brought to the surface and receiving 

 the ameliorating influences of the atmosphere in connection with 

 amendments or enrichments. The subsoil plow is not calculated 

 to improve any porous soils, whether of sandy or gravelly texture, 

 unless they contain a large admixture of friable shale that will be 

 disintegrated and made fine by the action. 



