150 



all more or less red after rain. That consistence is a valuable 

 sign, is shown by the fact that the stronger soils, or those 

 which contain not less than 5 per cent, of alumina, will grow 

 permanent grass and the oak ; and that the firmer, or those 

 rendered so by management, will preserve red clover from 

 the frost; while others more " deaf" and pulverulent, will 

 not grow red clover at all. Contrary to the Wolds, the 

 shallow soils are much inferior to those of moderate depth. 

 The vegetation on the south side of Doncaster is a certain 

 criterion that the land on that side is superior to that 

 of the north side. Geology explains why, as upon the 

 Wolds, shallow soils exist, for they are only found where 

 large bodies of water have passed over the rock, and worn 

 it out into valleys ; while on the south side of Doncaster,_ 

 the superior soil is caused by an admixture of sandstone 

 pebbles brought down the course of the Don, at no distant 

 period of the earth's history. 



In the Coal or Carboniferous series there is every variety 

 of colour in the soil, in its consistence, and in the vegetation 

 of particular districts ; and a casual observer would find no 

 order or regukrity. In some parts, even single fields lying 

 in east and west lines are of different value. But the 

 prevailing agricultural characters are strictly dependent upon 

 geological causes, and if Geology is unable, from want of 

 section, to explain the agriculture of the country upon the 

 New Red Sandstone, she alone is able to give any rational 

 explanation of the great variety of land observed west of the 

 limestone, between either Hickleton, Hemsworth, or Wake- 

 field, up to Penistone. Now all the strata of the Coal series 

 rise at a rapid angle to the west, and this at a greater rate 

 than the surface rises ; the various beds consequently come to 

 the surface, and extend across the country in north and south 

 lines; therefore, if similarity of soils from identity of strata 

 exist, they will be found to extend from north to south. 



