I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



455 



much rain-water,) and also from long drought 

 and great dryness of the soil, than could be 

 conceived in advance of experience. And 

 the extreme close and clayey texture does 

 not forbid very easy and good tillage, and 

 consequent good tilth of soil — and the land 

 is generally very productive, and the locali- 

 ty, in general, very healthy — though the 

 reverse of all these conditions would have 

 been inferred from the mere statement of 

 the natural features and constitution of the 

 land. And all these benefits and qualities, 

 so different from what would have been an- 

 ticipated, are owing to the highly calcare- 

 ous character of most of the surface, and of 

 the whole of the under lying beds. 



The surface of this whole region, (with 

 the few exceptions of alluvial bottoms,) is 

 everywhere undulating, and generally enough 

 so for the tilled and finely pulverized soil to 

 be washed off, very injuriously, by heavy 

 rains, on some parts of every field. Yet the 

 slopes are rarely steep enough anywhere to 

 be called hilly. Nor would such washing 

 occur under a different course of culture, or 

 alternate cropping, in which broad-cast crops, 

 and grass, &c., made parts of a varying 

 round of crops, instead of the now increas- 

 ing and almost unvarying tillage of cotton 

 and corn. It is this continual tillage, and 

 especially of cotton, which demands a per- 

 fectly pulverized and loose and clean soil, 

 that causes the ruinous impoverishment, and 

 mainly by washing, of the more southern 

 states generally; and which has caused great 

 damage even on these peculiar lands, which, 

 by their constitution, are especially fitted to 

 withstand the washing effects of rain. For- 

 merly, here, as everywhere else, there was 

 no care used to prevent or lessen their evil 

 eflects. The ploughing was in one uniform 

 direction throughout each field, and in 

 straight rows, and of course up and down the 

 faces of many of the slopes. Of course, 

 with all the land kept tilled every year, and 

 two-thirds of it under cotton culture, no soil 

 could be otherwise than greatly washed and 

 wasted. It was only owing to the peculiar 

 calcareous constitution, and the great depth 

 of the fertile soil here, that the whole coun- 

 try was not utterly destroyed by washing, as 

 has occurred on so much of the rolling lands 

 of middle Georgia, where the same causes 

 and neglect prevailed, without the existence 

 of the partial safeguards of 'the Alabama 

 cane-brake lands. In latter years, gradua- 

 ted or guard ditches on all the sloping sur- 



face, with horizontal rows and ploughing in 

 the intervals between the ditches, have gen- 

 erally been adopted- by all good planters — 

 and these, when well placed, and kept in 

 order, seem to be sufficient safe-guards 

 against the further extension of the former 

 injurious washing of the fields, even under 

 the usual continual succession of tillage 

 crops. 



The surface of the arable land, as exposed 

 to the eye when newly ploughed, (and be-, 

 fore being hidden by the growing crop,) is 

 everywhere spotted with different shades of 

 color, from black to yellowish and white. 

 The black soil (including the darkest gray,) 

 is known as " prairie land and of this 

 class, when the lime-rock rises nearly or 

 quite to the surface, it makes the ploughed 

 layer nearly white. The yellowish and red- 

 dish portions, intervening with the former, 

 are known as different varieties and grades 

 of post-oak land.'' These latter compre- 

 hend all the various tints and alternations of 

 brownish, yellowish and reddish soils, all 

 dull and imperfect tints, for these different 

 descriptive terms. The extents of space of 

 all these differently colored soils are from 

 less than an acre to ten or more acres to- 

 gether. More rarely, some one kind, and 

 more frequently of the black, extends for 

 hundreds of acres together. Yery different 

 agricultural qualities and values belong to 

 these different varieties of soils. Still, as I 

 was informed by sundry intelligent planters, 

 all these different soils were supposed, by all 

 the residents, to have the common property 

 of being highly calcareous. Indeed, I did 

 not hear an opinion to the contrary, or even 

 a doubt. Further, to establish this proposi- 

 tion, which my first personal view caused me 

 to doubt, my own testimony (as supposed) 

 was quoted aga§bst me — and I w-as told that 

 in my former published report (in Farmers' 

 Register,) of hard-specimens analyzed by 

 myself, I had stated that the ^' post-oak" soil 

 contained 25 per cent of carbonate of lime. 

 Since returning home, and being enabled to 

 refer to my former report, I find that this 

 supposition was a mistake. The only two 

 specimens of post-oak" soil formerly sent 

 to me, I had reported, (vol. III. Farmers' 

 Register,) to contain not a particle of car- 

 bonate of lime. When having the advan- 

 tage of the much more correct indications; 

 afforded by personal inspection of numerous, 

 soils, in place, as soon as I could obtain some 



muriatic acid, I 



began 



to test specimens- 



