_Its remarkable power of absorbing and retaining water, both as a liquid and as a vapor_ (I): _Its power of absorbing ammonia_ (II): _Its effect in promoting the disintegration and solution of mineral ingredients, that is the stony matters of the soil_ (III): _and_ _Its influence on the temperature of the soil_ (IV). The agricultural importance of these properties of peat is best illustrated by considering the faults of a certain class of soils. Throughout the State of Connecticut, for instance, are found abundant examples of light, leachy, hungry soils, which consist of coarse sand or fine gravel; are surface-dry in a few hours after the heaviest rains, and in the summer drouths, are as dry as an ash-heap to a depth of several or many feet. These soils are easy to work, are ready for the plow early in the spring, and if well manured give fair crops in wet seasons. In a dry summer, however, they yield poorly, or fail of crops entirely; and, at the best, they require constant and very heavy manuring to keep them in heart. Crops fail on these soils from two causes, viz.; _want of moisture_ and _want of food_. Cultivated plants demand as an indispensable condition of their growth and perfection, to be supplied with water in certain quantities, which differ with different crops. Buckwheat will flourish best on dry soils, while cranberries and rice grow in swamps. Our ordinary cereal, root, forage and garden crops require a medium degree of moisture, and with us it is in all cases desirable that the soil be equally protected from excess of water and from drouth. Soils must be thus situated either naturally, or as the result of improvement, before any steadily good results can be obtained in their cultivation. The remedy for excess of water in too heavy soils, is thorough drainage. It is expensive, but effectual. It makes the earth more porous, opens and maintains channels, through which the surplus water speedily runs off, and permits the roots of crops to go down to a considerable depth. What, let us consider, is the means of obviating the defects of soils that are naturally too porous, from which the water runs off too readily, and whose crops "burn up" in dry seasons? In wet summers, these light soils, as we have remarked, are quite productive if well manured. It is then plain that if we could add anything to them which would retain the moisture of dews and rains in spite of the summer-heats, our crops would be uniformly fair, provided the supply of manure were kept up.