5G6 Indications of Fertility or Barrenness of Soils. 
hundred others. I will suppose pasture-land which does not pro- 
duce more than 1 ton of hay per acre, when mown in its proper 
turn, to be barren. And with regard to arable land, considering 
it to be planted with such crops as are suitable, if it does not 
produce on the average more than 20 bushels of wheat, or 
30 bushels of barley, laeans, or oats, we will suppose it to be 
barren, and call these the limits. This would leave a very great 
range for fertile soils, which would in practice require to be 
classed into three divisions at least, which might correspond with 
the terms fertile, ntore fertile, and most fertile. In arable lands 
the extreme limit of most fertile would be at least three times the 
quantity of that which is simY>h' fertile, having, in many inslances, 
reached 60 bushels of wheat, 72 of barley, 90 of beans, or 96 of 
oats per acre, without any extraordinary management. Taking 
these figures, we should assume the range of the produce per acre 
of land of the lowest degree of fertility, or that which is simply 
called fertile, to be from 20 to 30 bushels of wheat : the more 
fertile, or land of the second degree of fertility, from 30 to 
40 bushels ; and the most fertile, from 40 to 60 bushels per acre. 
Land that will, with the ordinary course of husbandry, produce 
the last-mentioned quantity, is justly entitled to the term "most 
fertile;" but this quantity has reallv been produced by large tracts 
of land which have the name of alluvial deposits given to them 
by geologists. (See Alluvium ) To return to the subject of con- 
sistency, the tenacity will be sufficiently destroyed when, on taking 
a lump between the fingers, it can be reduced into smaller portions 
without forming into paste. If the soil be such as to admit of 
being formed into marbles by boys, and so tenacious as to stand 
baking, the consistency is too adhesive to be fertile. Also, if after 
being formed into marbles and stuck on the end of a stick, if the 
tenacity be such i;s to allow of the marble being thrown to a con- 
siderable distance, without crumbling or breaking, the soil is too 
adhesive to be fertile. 
It would appear from these simple considerations that soil 
which will not admit of being formed into marbles, or stuck on 
the end of slicks, and thrown to a distance, if not of a coarse 
silicious character, possesses a consistency favourable to fertility, 
and that such fact may be taken as an indication. 
If the land, when ploughed, cuts out as it were in one entire 
piece, and the furrow-slice does not break into lengths and become 
cracked across at very short intervals, its tenacity is too great to 
be fertile ; but if these things happen, and, on walking across the 
lands the exposed edges of the furrows are crushed by the feet, 
and crumble and leave the edges of the footmarks ragged, such 
will indicate the proper consistency of a fertile soil ; but, if the 
footmarks appear clean at the edges, and pressed down flat and 
