SHELBY COUNTY. 455 



through his extensive beds for the purpose of drjdng them to bring 

 them into cultivation. Where the peat becomes dry it is porous, 

 light and friable. It requires no breaking up to receive the crop, but is 

 only furrowed out to secure precision in the rows of corn that it may be 

 worked with the plow. The process of drying must continue from year 

 to year where the system of drainage is complete. The result may be 

 disastrous if such a bed of inflammable matter is exposed, as it must be, 

 to the malice or carelessness of any one who might set fire to it in the ex- 

 tremel}'-. dry weather of our late summ.'.r seasons. Already, imperfectly 

 dried out as the beds are yet, where persons have carelessly allowed fire 

 to catch in the surface of the peat deep holes have been burned, extend- 

 ing, doubtless, to the undried substratum. No means that could be 

 brought to bear in those regions would be efiVctual in quenching a fire 

 in one of those pi at beds if they are once thoroughly dried out. The 

 remedy I would suggest is one of prevention — it is to close up the system 

 of drains during the winter, allowing the water to stand in them, saturat- 

 ing the beds completely. The drains being opened in the spring, the 

 beds of peat would not become fully dried out during summer. By re- 

 taining moisture they will bring better crops and be safe from conflagra- 

 tion. 



THE EAIN-FALL. 



This county is near the border of the area marked in the "Rfdn-Chart" 

 of the Smithsonian Institution in which the average of rain-fall is forty 

 inches. In the absence of other reliable data, any indefinite impressions 

 that the amount is less than this must be disregarded. We are apt to 

 judge by the effects; for example, the state of the crops, whereas the 

 larger portion of the rain- fall is at a season when no visible influence can 

 reach the crops from it. Plainly, all that rain and snow-water, which 

 runs off the frozen crust of the ground in the winter, does not aflect, one 

 way or the other, the crops of the ensuing summer. The same can be 

 said of the most of the rain, which runs off as soon as it falls, at any 

 season. 



An interest attaches to the amount of water which falls, in various 

 forms, in this and the adjoining counties, particularly to the north-east, 

 on account of the requirements of the canal. Data are wanting for deter- 

 mining the amount of water carried off by the canal and the river from 

 the area above the Summit-level of the canal in this and the adjoining 

 counties on the north-east. The nature of the soil is such that it will 

 shed as large a proportion of the water which falls upon it as any other 

 soil in the State. An immense quantity flows from above the highest 



