SHELBY COUNTY. 453 
character, which do not so readily undergo decomposition. This is what 
we call vegetable mould, mixed with clay—loam. In dry situations, ex- 
posed to the action of the atmosphere, logs, grass, leaves, straw, utterly 
disappear and leave no trace behind. Thesame material heaped together, 
in wet situations, does not entirely decay, as every one must have observ- 
ed, but gradually disintegrates, and becomes a uniform mass of dark- 
colored matter. A cool situation makes this process more sure and com- 
plete. Partially decayed vegetation becomes mould, muck or peat, ac- 
cording to the material, the location and extent of the process of decay. 
These vegetable compounds do not decay readily, but do gradually, and 
hence results a common experience in the use of muck as manure. Un- 
til a dissolution of the muck occurs, it will not nurture vegetation, hence 
it is often necessary for it to be exposed a season or two to the action 
of the atmosphere before it becomes sufficiently advanced in decomposi- 
tion to give up its elements of fertility to vegetation. My conclusion is 
that this light-colored soil, not being a good absorber of water, and being 
so situated as to drain it off readily, the vast amount of vegetation, in 
different forms, which has grown upon it has entirely decayed and passed 
off in the forms in which its elements first came to it, namely, as gases. 
Here is the place to speak of one of the most interesting features of 
this upland soil in the county—the fine beds of peat which mark the 
line of the water-shed. Peat is a vegetable product—it is an accumula- 
tion of vegetable matter in circumstances in which decay is arrested. 
A cool climate, and a moist situation are the conditions in which peat is 
formed. On the scarcely sloping tract, lying just where the drainage, 
being both ways, was effective neither way, and where the surface was 
formed of a soil quite impermeable to water, we find to-day several exten- 
sive beds of peat of good quality. They lie in Van Buren township, and 
near the line of the new Kettler turnpike. Mr. William Kettler owns 
about one hundred and forty acres of peat; in section ten of the same 
township are one hundred and forty acres more; in section fourteen, 
ten acres; in section twenty-two, about thirty acres, and smaller quanti- 
ties in one or two other places, being over three hundred acres in all. It 
is not certainly known how deep these beds are; it is supposed they will 
average at least ten feet. I did not learn the facts upon which this belief 
rests, but, from the character of the men from whom I obtained the infor- 
mation, I feel that the statement can be relied upon. Where I examined 
the peat, on Mr. Kettler’s farm, although large ditches had been con- 
ducted through it to drain it, there was no place where the bottom could 
be seen, nor the distance to it from the bottom of the ditch be ascertained, 
by such explorations as we could make with a fence-stake. 
