chap. v.J DIFFERENT SOILS. 95 



formerly planted at a depth of only twenty inches, and some- 

 times, though never very generally, by means of a plough. 

 The instrument was dragged over and over the same ground, 

 till the required depth was attained. Such a practice has 

 long since ceased ; indeed, there are very few places in the 

 island, from its rocky nature, where a plough could penetrate 

 twenty inches into the soil. The vine in the south is now 

 always planted in trenches, varying from four to six feet in 

 depth. The depth of the trench is regulated by the nature 

 of the soil. The object in cutting so deep is to allow the 

 roots of the vine to penetrate sufficiently far through the 

 fresh turned earth, to prevent their being dried by the effects 

 of the sun, and a long-continued season of drought, when 

 water for irrigation is scarce. Lumps of pedra molle, and other 

 stones, are placed at the bottom of the trench to keep the 

 earth loose, and prevent the roots of the vines from reaching 

 the stiff soil below. The trenches are filled up slantingly 

 one-third of their depth, the bacello, or cutting, never being 

 planted lower than two-thirds of the depth opened. The new 

 roots shoot mainly from the upper part of the bacello, and at 

 no great distance from the surface of the ground : the part 

 below the roots decays and rots off. When rooted vines are 

 planted they are not put in so deep, although the ground is 

 trenched in the same manner as for bacellos. 



DIFFERENT SOILS. 



The names given to the different kinds of soil in which the 

 vine is planted are saibro (decomposed red tufa), cascalho 

 (stony soil), pedra molle (an arenaceous soil, of decomposed 

 yellow tufa), and tnassa})es (clay resulting from the decompo- 

 sition of dark tufas). The vine lasts the longest in saibro 

 and cascalho. In pedra molle and massapes it produces at 



