476 



THE SOUTIOJKN PLANTER. 



[August 



composition is independent of the variety 

 of rocks which they overhe. Some of the 

 most fertile are those formed by deposits, 

 and the amount of fertiHzing material car- 

 ried from one spot to another, cr entirely 

 lost in the ocean, defies any estimate. 



Drs. Dickeson and Brown estimate the 

 annual deposit from the Mississippi river to 

 amount to the enormous quantity of 28,188,- 

 053,892 1-6 cubic feet of solid matter. 

 That amount is independent of the coarse 

 sand and p^ravel transported by the river 

 current, which they were unable to esti- 

 mate. 



Mr. Leonard Horner estimates that "the 

 Rhine carries down every year 1,973,433 

 cubic yards of earth, and if this process has 

 been going on at the same rate for the last 

 two thousand years, and there is no evidence 

 that the river has undergone any material 

 change during that period, then the Rhine 

 must in that time have carried down mate- 

 rials sufficient to form a stratum of stone a 

 yard thick, extending over an area more 

 than thirty-six miles square. 



From the nature of the constituents of 

 silt, and the finely comminuted state in 

 which it is deposited, we should expect it to be 

 fertile; and so long as the deposits continue, 

 so long will their richness remain. Such 

 soils are among the richest known. The 

 low grounds bordering on the Nile, the Mis- 

 sissippi, the Rhone, the Danube, the Po, 

 the Wolga, Orinoco, &c., are examples, and 

 maintain their fertility without apparent di- 

 minution. The composition of alluvium de- 

 pends upon the geological formations and 

 character of the country through which the 

 waters pass ; and the nature of the deposit 

 again depends upon the current. If the 

 stream be sluggish, the particles are much 

 finer than if the water be rapid or turbu- 

 lent. When the uplands of our country 

 have been impoverished by successive crop- 

 pings or injudicious tillage, the low grounds 

 will resist longer, and continue to be a re- 

 source. But the amount of low ground is 

 insufficient to supply the requirements of a 

 dense population ; hence the necessity of 

 fertilizers. Organic manures, those of a 

 nitrogenous nature, have been used from 

 time immemorial. It is said " that the 

 barn-yard yields a panacea for all the far- 

 mer's ills." This is not rigorously correct; 

 for there are soils which never can be ren- 

 dered fertile by the application of barn- 



yard manure, but which may be improved 

 by correctives, and the addition of organic 

 substances. 



\_To he Continued.'] 



From American Stock Journal. 



Cattle Distemper. 



[Tliis disease is spreading at the North, and 

 although the most summary means for extermi- 

 nating it, have been adopted by the Massachu- 

 setts Legislature, it is feared that it will not be 

 arrested in its progress until great national loss 

 shall have resulted from its ravages. We pre- 

 sent the reader with the able verterinary sur- 

 geon Dr. Dadd's description of the symptojns, 

 name, &c., of the disease. — [Ed. So. Pl. 



The Pleuro-Pneumonia Exudative. 



DESCRIPTION AND SYMPTOMS OP THE 

 DISEASE. 



The locality of pleuro-pneumonia exuda- 

 tive is within the chest, the parts affected 

 are the lining membrane of the thoracic 

 cavity and the thoracic viscera. The dis- 

 ease sometimes commences on the pleural 

 membrane which is found on the interior walls 

 of the chest and on the surface of the lungs 

 — it then occasions much pain, as in com- 

 mon pleurisy, and is accompanied by a deep 

 seated and painful cough; as the disease 

 progresses the chest becomes the seat of 

 exudation of serum and lymph, the walls of 

 the chest acquire a coating of lymph which 

 undergoes the usual change and becomes 

 organized into tough fibrine, and this be- 

 comes so firmly united to the pleura, that it 

 requires considerablo force after death to 

 tear it off; not only does it occupy the 

 plura-costalis, but is also found on the dia- 

 phram. As the water — serum — lymph and 

 fibrous tissue accumulate, it gradually com- 

 presses the lung, on whichever side the 

 foreign materials happen to occur, until the 

 lung itself, if unaffected by the disease, is 

 forced up into the superior or uper region 

 of the chest, and finally the mechanical 

 pressure is so great that the lung is forced 

 into a solid ball no bigger, in some cases, 

 than a man's first, and under such circum- 

 stances some persons are led to suppose that 

 the lung is not to be found — " all gone.'' 



It happens occasionally that while one 

 side of the chesk is filling up with serum, 



