Landmass

“ Still more rarely can they compare the past with the actual condition of the provinces in question, and trace the progress of their conversion from forest-crowned hills, luxuriant pasture grounds, and abundant cornfields and vineyards well watered by springs and fertilizing rivulets, to bald mountain ridges, rocky declivities, and steep earth-banks furrowed by deep ravines with beds now dry, now filled by torrents of fluid mud and gravel hurrying down to spread themselves over the plain, and dooming to everlasting barrenness the once productive fields. ”

“ In countries with a humid sky, or moderately undulating surface and an equable temperature, a small extent of forest, enough to serve as a mechanical screen against the action of the wind in localities where such protection is needed, suffices. But most of the territory occupied by civilized man is exposed, by the character of its surface and its climate, to a physical degradation which cannot be averted except by devoting a large amount of soil to the growth of the woods. ”

“ In their valleys, mountains lose something of their barrier nature, and approximate the level of the plains. Here they harbor oases of denser population and easier intercourse. Valleys favor human settlement through the milder climate of their lower elevation, the accumulation of soil on their floors, their sheltered environment, and their command of such routes of communication as the highlands afford. They are the avenues into and within a mountain system, and therefore radically influence its history by their direction and location. ”

“ Society must first of all consider the land as a whole—its topographical qualities, its mountains, plains, woods, lakes, rivers, ponds, heaths, swamps, moors, etc. The topography, together with the geographical location of land, both of which are unchangeable, exercises certain influences upon climate and the qualities of the soil. ”

“ The shelter of a range of hills, a southern aspect, a sandy soil, will thus produce conditions which may differ greatly from those of a place—perhaps at no great distance—situated on a wind-swept northern slope with a cold clay soil.
The character of the climate of a country or district influences, as everyone knows, both the cultivation of the soil and the products which it yields, and thus indirectly as well as directly exercises a profound effect upon Man. ”

“ Changes in the Coast-Line due to Oscillation of the Land.—Land areas are exposed to the erosive action of wind, rain, streams, etc., and are sculptured by these agencies into valleys, cañons, peaks, ridges, and other familiar topographic forms. The various processes by which land areas are modified lead in general to a roughening of the surface. As an extreme illustration, a high plateau becomes dissected by streams so as to form an intricate system of rugged mountain ridges and peaks, with deep, steep-sided valleys between. ”

“ I must think of my people! You see, if I put them on the other side of the ridge, they would be exposed to the east wind—and the more that every door and window would have to be to the east. You know yourselves how bitterly it blows down the strath! Besides, we should there have to build over good land much too damp to be healthy, every foot of which will be wanted to feed them! ”

“ The relativity of geographical advantages in different historical periods warns us against assuming in all times a sparsity of population in mountains, even when the adjoining lowlands offer many attractions of climate and soil. In ages of incessant warfare, when the motive of safety has strongly influenced distribution of population, protected mountain sites have attracted settlement from the exposed plains, and thus increased the relative density of population on the steep slopes. ”

“ Benching the ground so as to prevent a movement of the toe, does not aid equal settlement nor keep the portion of an embankment above the level of the ground from spreading, except from the resistance offered by the cohesion and friction of the soil; whereas, if the ground slopes inwards towards the centre the earth has a tendency to rest and come together, and therefore not to slip upon the slopes. ”

“ The Plains attest God's wisdom in usually providing surface-rock in generous abundance as the only reliable conservative force against the insidious waste and wear of earth by water. Storms, rills, and rivers are constantly at work to carry off the soil of every island and continent, and lose it in the depths of seas and oceans. ”

“ In the valuation of land the next thing we have to consider is the steepness of the gradients on it. Now after having had much experience of steep land, land on moderate slopes, and land which might almost be called flat, I have no hesitation in giving a decided preference to the moderately sloping land. I object to the steep land, because it is troublesome to work and manure, and because the ridges on it are sure to be poor; and to the flat land, because the soil is apt to become sodden in our heavy monsoons, and because it is soon apt to harden, and thus is troublesome to work. ”

“ This being the nature of the country the farmer can but hedge his land and fields with stone: he is in a measure compelled to do so, since the earth is full of it and the land strewn with boulders; to make a field he must remove it and bestow it somewhere. Now after centuries of this process of removing and piling up stones, the farm land has become covered over with a network of these enduring hedges, or fences, intersecting each other at all angles ”

“ Whether we examine the mountain or the plain, whether we consider the disintegration of the rocks or the softer strata of the earth, whether we regard the shores of seas or the central plains of continents, whether we contemplate fertile lands or deserts, we find evidence of a general dissolution and decay of the solid surface of the globe. Every great river and deep valley gives evidence of the attrition of the land. The purpose of the dry land is to sustain a system of plants and animals ”

“ We boast of having harnessed the powers of nature and yet we allow millions of acres of land to remain barren, although we know theoretically that there is not a single district that must of necessity remain a desert. We know that every kind of soil, even if it consists of iron shoe nails or crushed stones, can be made productive by heat and water, whose application is not beyond human power except—perhaps—at the poles. ”

“ The soil must be constantly renewed and enriched by manure in the same way, and the masonry of the retaining walls kept in repair. Whenever possible these costly terraced fields are located by preference on southward facing slopes, where the tilt of the land makes the fields catch the rays of the sun almost at right angles and thus counteracts the chill of the higher altitude, while the mountain behind protects the growing crops from cold northern winds. Good arable land, being limited in amount, commands a high price ”

“ The Subsidence of Land.—Elevations can be shown to have taken place by fossils, and by other evidences of former sea levels which are left on the surface; but depressions leave but few indications of change of level. It is yet doubtful whether the depression is equal to the elevation; that is, whether the amount of land remains nearly constant, or whether there has been an augmentation of the dry land within the tertiary and recent periods. We are certain that the augmentation, if any, has not been equal to the elevation, for subsidences to a great amount are known to have taken place. ”

“ Such a varied form of ground was eminently favourable for human settlement. The earliest races could find or make rock-shelters almost anywhere. The fertility of the soil afforded to their successors good pasturage and fields for tillage, while the hillocks, girt round with cliffs, and the flat-topped ridges, shelving precipitously to lower ground, offered excellent sites for fortification and defence. Owing to the porous nature of the ground, much of the rain sinks at once beneath the surface, instead of flowing off in brooks. Hence many of the valleys are usually dry, unless in wet seasons. ”

“ There a hilly or mountainous interior putting obstacles in the way of landward expansion, sterile slopes, a paucity of level, arable land, an excessive or deficient rainfall withholding from agriculture the reward of tillage—some or all of these factors combined to compel the inhabitants to seek on the sea the livelihood denied by the land. ”

“ At all events, with such a proportion of land and sea surface as now exists, with such a small bulk of land above the enormous bulk of water, and with no known cause why the dry land rather than the sea-bottom should be constantly elevated, we must admit it to be almost certain that great fluctuations of the area of the land must occur, and that, while those fluctuations could not very considerably increase the area of the land they might immensely diminish it. ”

“ Interspersed among the hills are numerous fine tracts of arable land, which may in general be alleged of the valleys of the numerous rivers and creeks by which the country is watered. The soil upon the hills is generally productive, except where the surface is rocky and the declivities abrupt, which is more particularly the case in the vicinity of rivers, where the high lands are divided into numerous knobs, being cut by deep ravines with abrupt and precipitous banks. ”

“ The formation of terraces of earth, and by allowing the ground to subside until movement is arrested, but there may be a porous seam of harder soil, such as gravel, under the soft ground, then care must be taken not to dam back the flow of the underground waters by the subsidence of the added earth or the whole embankment may slide, become softened and finally be swept away ”

“ The first question that is presented in dealing with a hill that has been cut up with ravines is to determine the perimeter of the lands to be restored. The area should not be limited to the banks of the torrent and its branches, for these banks, being continually undermined and always changing, would continue, by giving way, to enlarge the basin if they were not themselves fixed by vegetation. ”

“ A short and very high embankment may stand where one of considerable length would slip, consequent upon variations in the character and condition of the earth, the bearing capacity of the ground, the state of the weather, the flow of the surface water, general homogeneousness, the configuration of the ground, and other deteriorating influences; but draining, careful deposition, and a judicious adoption of the varying slope system, and other precautionary works, will conduce to stability. ”

“ No application, perhaps, of human skill and labor tends so greatly to vary the state of the habitable surface, as that employed in the drainage of lakes and marshes, since not only the stations of many animals and plants, but the general climate of a district, may thus be modified. It is also a kind of alteration to which it is difficult to find anything analogous in the agency of inferior beings ”

“ The soil is sharpened.’ He explained to me that in Red river valley, where the land is heavier, it would take very many years to bring about that result, and it would not be of so much value to this generation, but in the lighter soil, farther west, it has a marked effect, and, as he argued, there is no question about it. ”

“ While the leading elements of the topography have remained for many long ages essentially the same, there have arisen since the beginnings of history, many important minor changes in the landscape, mainly due to human interference, whereby the progress of the population has been more or less affected. Prominent among these changes has been the clearing of the dense woodlands that once covered so large a proportion of the surface. Innumerable bogs and fens have been drained and converted into arable land; lakes have been silted up by natural causes or have been emptied by artificial drainage. ”

“ It is always observed in the American States, that clearing the ground not only causes running springs to disappear, but dries up the stagnant pools and the spongy soils of the low grounds. The first roads in those States ran along the ridges, when practicable, because there only was the earth dry enough to allow of their construction, and, for the same reason, the cabins of the first settlers were perched upon the hills. ”

“ Atmospheric effect and natural gravitation is constantly carrying the soil from the upper land, from the hills into the bottoms, and consequently it is in the latter that we find the richest land, best calculated to repay the toil of the agriculturist. ”

“ The deep valley is therefore the receptacle not only for the water that oozes from its sides, but subterranean channels, bursting as land-springs from all parts of the walls of the valley, wash down the more soluble portions of earth, and continually waste away the soil. ”

“ When it is known that soft, peaty, muddy, or silty earth overlies level solid ground, and it is certain it cannot escape, and can only be condensed by weighting until it will permanently bear the strain required, it can be built upon; although should there be more pressure at one place than another, or the character of the soil vary, in certain places be swampy and in others dry, the surrounding ground will probably rise where the weight is the least ”