QUATERNARY DEPOSITS. 
231 
from three to four feet higli; the surface composed of black muck-like earth, which has a 
sharp sour taste. The mass is so soft that a stick may be thrust into it for several feet. The 
part below the surface yields sulphuretted hydrogen. In the hot seasons, the whole mass, it 
is said, presents a foaming appearance, and is very soft. The effects observed are doubtless 
due to the sulphur of the water, vegetable matter, and air. 
Soil. 
In this part of the survey, if any thing was expected beyond the collecting of soils for ana¬ 
lysis, there must be disappointment. A survey, to be productive of benefit as regards agri¬ 
culture, must be something like the plan pursued at this time in Massachusetts, but combining 
a knowledge of the geology of the subsoil as to local or distant origin, and the kind as to rock. 
Divided as this subject was between the chemist and the geologists, as the former could make 
the selection for analysis with much more efficiency in all respects, it was considered better 
to leave it with him altogether, though with no decided understanding upon the subject. In 
good faith, the subject was attempted in the beginning of the survey; but when the number 
of rocks was found to be so great, and the alluvial or transported materials so abundant and 
so generally diffused, it did not appear possible to attain to any useful results, even the most 
general, until the survey was completed. The letter of the survey could readily have been 
complied with, and the soils collected and analysed ; but judging from the attempts elsewhere 
made, it is not very probable that any very satisfactory results would have been obtained. 
What cannot be done to advantage under the circumstances in which we are placed, had better 
remain unattempted until there is a prospect that it may be successfully accomplished. The 
preliminary knowledge to a useful and therefore a creditable collection of soils, is a geological 
survey, which shall make us acquainted with the materials from whence soils were derived ; 
that is, with the different rocks and their distribution, for from these sources all soils proceed ; 
and which shall at the same time put the collector on his guard as to the two general kinds 
of soil, those of the decomposition of the rock in place, and those of transported materials. 
The next step is a knowledge of the nature and growth of the various objects of man’s culture. 
Where a State like New-York possesses an agricultural association coextensive with its 
territory, each member possessing a full knowledge of the soil or soils of his section, with the 
aid of a geological map, and a comparison of facts with each other, analysis would not fail to 
furnish useful results. But greater no doubt would be the gain, were the geological and local 
agricultural knowledge embodied in one individual, possessed of the other necessary requisites ; 
for in this case, there would be greater unity of action, and of course a corresponding harmony 
in the results. 
As a chemist and a farmer, the reporter has not attached sufficient value to the analysis of 
s.oil, to have one made of the land he cultivates, though admitting that benefit to agriculture 
would follow if rightly conducted. Analysis should have a comparative definite object: For 
example, to determine the nature of the soil of the large divisions of the State, where but one 
