GREENE COUNTY. 689 



sloping and easily drained surfaces, but sometimes in flat-lying tracts, of 

 greater or less extent. To the latter of these areas the black soils are 

 confined. If the stratified Drift has furnished their origin, they will 

 agree in character with the soils derived from the limestone gravel, as 

 represented in analysis No. 4. If formed from the weathering of the 

 bowlder clay, they prove to be the counterparts of the yellow clays last 

 described. The difference is shown very plainly in the capabilities of 

 the two kinds of tracts respectively. Both form blue-grass land, and 

 furnish the best of pasturage, but only the former can be turned with 

 profit into corn grounds. These constitute, indeed, the best corn ground 

 of the county — the river bottoms not being excepted. A considerable 

 area in the south-eastern part of the county, forming part of a much 

 broader area which stretches through Madison and Fayette couniies, 

 belongs to this division, and numerous isolated tracts are scattered 

 throughout the county. Frequently the most stubborn of the white 

 clays will inclose some central area that lies at a lower level than the 

 rest, and the drainage of which is consequently obstructed. This central 

 tract has thus been changed in color from white to black, and has been 

 charged with vegetable matter enough to ameliorate it for half a century 

 at least. It rewards abundantly the labors of the husbandman, while 

 the surrounding lands, that differ from this in no respect but one, viz., 

 that their proportion of organic matter is smaller by five to ten per cent., 

 are tilled without profit, or even at a loss. 



There are no soils in southern Ohio that produce as fine blue grass — 

 that great basis of agricultural wealth— as those varieties of the black 

 lands that have been derived from the limestone gravels. 



A single analysis is appended of an upland prairie soil from the farm 

 of John Howell, Esq., of Clarke county (No. 10). Chemistry shows it to 

 be extremely well equipped for all the purposes of agriculture— a fact 

 which has been amply demonstrated by practical tests. It agrees very 

 closely with analysis No. 4, as will be seen by a comparison of the re- 

 sults. All that was said of the limestone gravel soil will apply to the 

 one now under consideration. ' 



These analyses were executed for the Survey by Prof. Wormley. They 

 are full of scientific interest, and, it is also believed, of practical value. 

 Some of the inferences fairly deducible from these figures have been 

 made in the foregoing pages, and others will suggest themselves to the 

 intelligent reader. 



No. 1. Mad Eiver bottoms. 

 " 2. Buck Creek bottoms. 

 " 3. Subsoil of No. 2. 

 44 



