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these are represented by red sandstones sufficiently hard and compact to form
good building stone. The value of these lands is materially influenced by
the proximity of these shales or sandstones to the surface—where they lie near
to it, the soil is unproductive, being liable to injury by droughts, as there is
not sufficient depth of soil to retain a supply of water for the use of the crops
in dry weather. When this is the case the soil should be ploughed as deeply
as possible and manured with lime, containing a small per centage of mag-
nesia—when basins occur they should always be drained, though these drains
involve the expense of cutting through ledges of such rocks as occur on these
lands, for when the water which falls on them can only escape by evaporation,
good crops can never be produced.

Without giving here the various analyses of this class of soils, which were
made from specimens taken from near Middleburg, from Dr. Leggett's farm,
from Mr. S. Reindollar's, near Taneytown, from Mr. Bassett's, from Col. Piper's,
of the Antrem estate, one of the most beautiful and elegant and productive of
the estates of Maryland, and from various other places, I will only name the
proper manures for their improvement. The necessary quantities and mode
of application of these I have already shown under their appropriate heads, to
which I refer those interested.

First, they should be manured with a limestone, containing a small quantity
of magnesia, and if it contains other substances capable of absorbing, when
burnt the food of plants from the atmosphere, so much the better. There is a
limestone known in the neighborhood as Rheinhart's, which contains in its
natural state about eleven and a half per cent, of carbonate of magnesia, and
which contains of sand, talc slate and other similar constituents, about twenty
per cent. When this limestone is burnt, these talc slates, sand, &c,
form combinations with the lime and become strong absorbants, and retainers
of all that which the atmosphere affords to crops, especially of ammonia; it
when applied to these soils will not only improve their mechanical texture,
making them when stiff, more loamy, light and porous, when too light and
loose, more stiff, compact and retentive, but will at the same time afford the
means of giving them the quick acting substance, ammonia. It has all the
permanent effects of pure lime, and to some extent the immediate influence of
Peruvian guano. The experience of the best practical farmers of this section of
the country have confirmed this opinion.

These soils are uniformily deficient in plaster and salt; these should be ap-
plied to the crops in the mode pointed out in the section treating of these
articles. Whenever these lands are too wet, and in many places this is the
case, they should be thoroughly ditched and drained; without this, no return
need be expected from labor, nor remuneration for expenses in manures.
Where the rocks and shales lie near to the surface, the first thing to be done is
to prevent the loss of soil by the effect of the washing of heavy rains, and to
effect this, I know of no better plan than surface drains, made with a plow,
and subsequently cleaned out with the hoe, sufficiently near to each other to
carry off all the surplus water of the soil; the water by these means being dis-
tributed in many channels, can no where collect in sufficient abundance to
carry off the soil and make unsightly gullies. These drains should have but a
slight fall, and end by conveying the water to a fence, woodland or some stream.
In these locations, soils should be plowed deeply, as the deeper the soil the
more room would the surplus water have to diffuse itself and prevent injurious
washing.

The benefits resulting from the above recommendations will be two fold,
first, the direct saving of a large quantity of land, for when the whole mass of
the soil is washed off, some years must elapse before the hard shaly subsoil
becomes sufficiently disintegrated and decomposed to furnish a good founda-
tion for crops; secondly, the retention of the finely divided particles of soil,
that part which contributes directly to the nourishment of the plant, from being