122 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
near his own barn. Then eastern lands sell at com- 
paratively low prices; all along the Atlantic sea- 
board land can be bought for from $40 to $75 per 
acre that will, with proper preparation, grow from 
three to seven tons of alfalfa hay a year. Some 
western men are seeing this and coming back to the 
neglected Atlantic states, and with splendid west- 
ern faith and enthusiasm are building alfalfa soils 
there and reaping rich profits therefrom. I have in 
mind very many instances where liming lands has 
brought alfalfa after it had repeatedly failed before 
the lime was applied. 
Effects of Lime.—When God made soils He often 
made them by grinding up rock masses, either by 
use of glacial icebergs or by the grinding action of 
rivers. When these rock masses were of limestone, 
the result was a limestone soil filled with particles 
great and small of ground limestone or carbonate of 
lime. In some soils there are enormous amounts of 
this material. In some very fertile soils of northern 
Illinois, taking the top five feet there will be found 
in one acre as mich as 500 tons of carbonate of 
lime. Such soils are always rich and productive. 
They are always natural alfalfa soils, provided they 
are well drained. Along most rivers the alluviums 
are pretty well stored with carbonate of lime, thus 
one sees the river bottoms growing alfalfa well when 
the near lying uplands are too sour to grow it at all. 
It is because of the greater amount of lime in these 
alluvial soils, that and the better drainage and fer- 
tility all around, that mark them as alfalfa lands. 
