magnesian earth in certain limes used for manure, and thus indicate its beneficial or injurious effects on vegetation. I should not like lime containing 20 per cent. of this earth; but when it contains a much smaller proportion, I should not think it very deleterious. This earth acts as a caustic to vegetation, and, neither being soluble in water, nor possessing the other virtue of lime, diminishes the number of bushels used according to its existence, and thus deprives the crop of that portion of benefit: but after all, as Kirwan says, the secret processes of vegetation take place in the dark, exposed to the various and indeterminable influence of the atmosphere; and hence the difficulty of determining on what peculiar circumstance success or failure depends, for the diversified experience of years alone can afford a rational foundation for solid and specific conclusions. The real goodness of a soil consists principally, perhaps, in the power it possesses of maintaining a certain degree of moisture; for without this, the plant could have no power of deriving nutriment from any aliment: it might be planted on a dung-hill; but if this had no moisture in it, no nutriment would be yielded; but as long as the soil preserves a moisture, either by its own constituent parts, or by means of a retentive substratum, vegetation goes on. Continue the moisture, and increase the aliment, and the plant will flourish in proportion; but let the moisture be denied by soil, substratum, or manure, and vegetation ceases; for, though certain plants will long subsist by moisture obtained from the air, yet, generally speaking, without a supply by the root, they will languish and fade. Our dairy processes, I believe, present nothing deserving of particular notice. From our milk, after being skimmed for butter, we make a thin, poor cheese, rendered at a low price, but for which there is a constant demand. Some of our cold lands, too, yield a kind greatly esteemed for toasting; and we likewise manufacture a thicker and better sort, though we do not contend in the market with the productions of north Wilts, or the deeper pastures of Cheshire or Huntingdon. The agriculture of a small district like ours affords no great scope to expatiate upon: great deviations from general practice we do not aim at; experimental husbandry is beyond our means, perhaps our faculties. Local habits, though often the subject of censure, are frequently such as the “genius of the soil” and situation render necessary, and the experience of years has proved most advantageous.