4 



Relations of Geology to Agriculture 



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change in forest trees, in character of soil, and in nature of rock, 

 are at once simultaneous and determined by a common cause. 



The following section (No. I.) gives an idea of the way in 

 which these rocks occur in connexion with the coal measures, 

 and of the kind of soils which they respectively form : — 



The section commences on the left 

 with the trap and altered rocks which 

 bound the coal-field towards the south, 

 as at the head of Belleisle bay, or 

 on the Hammond river, about twenty 

 miles from the town of St. John. On 

 these rocks scanty soils are found, 

 and the gloom of the narrow-leaved 

 forest is rarely broken by the intrusion 

 of the more cheerful beech, the oak, or 

 the maple. But on the rounded hills 

 of the red conglomerate (1), — which in 

 Albert county remind the English tra- 

 veller of the hills of our own Monmouth- 

 shire — broad-leaved forests of various 

 trees cheer the eye, while the free and 

 open soils which rest on them, though 

 sometimes too gravelly, yet admit of being 

 cultivated along steep slopes till the 

 waving corn crowns the very tops of the 

 hills. In the beautiful Sussex vale — 

 justly the boast and pride of the pro- 

 vince — and in some of its tributary val- 

 leys, the eye recognises with pleasure 

 the features, both physical and agricul- 

 tural, which are familiar in the red 

 sandstone slopes of Strathmore, in the 

 richly-farmed red sandstone fringe of 

 Sutherland, and where a tillage hardly to 

 be surpassed crowns the hills of Wool- 

 ler, and accompanies the Northumbrian 

 tourist to the foot of the Cheviot hills. 



Over the red conglomerate (1) lies the 

 blue limestone (2). On this rock the 

 soil is sometimes thin, and, like our own 

 blue limestones, the rock breaks out in 

 some places into abrupt cliffs and naked 

 slopes. Generally, however, it is covered 

 with soils which are easily brought into 

 culture, and are especially favourable to 

 the growth of wheat. Of the native 

 forest trees of North America, the white 



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