KINDS OF SOILS. 143 
and fertility. Unfortunately, while there are almost num- 
berless varieties of soil having numberless grades of pro- 
ductive power, we are very deficient in terms by which to 
express concisely even the fact of their differences, not to 
mention our inability to define these differences with ac- 
curacy, or our ignorance of the precise nature of their 
peculiarities. 
As regards mode of formation or deposition, soils are 
distinguished into Sedentary and Transported. The lat- 
ter are subdivided into Drift, Alluvial, and Colluviatl 
soils, 
Sedentary Soils, or Sodls in place, are those which have 
not been transported by geological agencies, but which 
remain where they were formed, covering or contiguous 
to the rock from whose disintegration they originated. 
Sedentary soils have usually little depth. An inspection 
of the rock underlying such soils often furnishes most 
valuable information regarding their composition and 
probable agricultural value; because the still unweathered 
rock reveals to the practised eye the nature of the min- 
erals, and thus of the elements, composing it, while in the 
soil these may be indistinguishable. 
In New England and the region lying north of the Ohio 
and east of the Missouri rivers, soils in place are not 
abundant as compared with the entire area. Nevertheless 
they do occur in many small patches. Thus the red-sand- 
stone of the Connecticut Valley often crops out in that 
part of New England, and, being, in many localities, of a 
friable nature, has crumbled to soil, which now lies undis- 
turbed in its original position. So, too, at the base of trap- 
bluffs may be found trap-soils, still full of sharp-angled 
‘fragments of the rock. 
Transported Soils, (subdivided into drift, alluvial, and 
colluvial), are those which have been removed toa dis- 
tance from the rock-beds whence they originated, by the 
