SOILS. The fertility of Irish soils has long been raeognized. About half of the island is formed of linwstone, whose soils are proverbially rich. The red marls, calcareous grits, slate, and igneous rocks have also contributed fertilizing elements. The fact that the former glacial con ditions transported the rocks of many localities and mixed them with those of others has, as in England. been very beneficial to the agricultural interests. Thus limestone detritus from the central plain was spread over hundreds of thou sands of acres outside of it, contributing ele ment, of fertility which the local ricks did not. possess. In some regions the soil is naturally pour, and in many others bad tillage or over cropping has reduced fertility. Bog and barren mountain lands cover about one-fifth of the total area.
Fion.t. The Irish flora consists largely of English migrants, and England in turn derived most of her (lora from the neighboring continent. The sedges, rushes, and ferns arc most. abundant in the wetter west. Grass is by far the largest product of the soil in every county of Ireland. The pastoral lands (permanent grass) include about four-fifths. and the arable lands (cereal• root, and fibre crops. and hay tinder rotation) one-lifth of all lands utilized for agrieultural and stock-raising purposes. The forests (chiefly oak and in the lower grounds. anti birch and pines in the higher regions) cover only a very small part of the area.
FAr.NA. The fauna differs in no marked de gree from that of England or France, and is largely a thing of the past. The great Irish deer and the garefowl (q.v.) were exterminat ed in prehistoric times; and since civilization began Ireland has lost its bear, wolf, wildcat.
beaver. native cattle, and other species of mam and birds. Nothing remains except the small rodents of the woods and fields, and such small birds as belong to the fields, gardens, and seashow. The popular saying that there are no snakes in 1 relinol is true; but there are none in scot hind, and only tau in England.. British standard works on natural history cover Ireland, but it has had also a special treatise of high repute in Thompson, (aural History of Inland (London, 18-19-51, 4:ounoi . The central plain of Ireland is underlaid by limestone strata belonging to the basil I port ion of the Ca rboni fermis system. l'po.r Carboniferous rock., including the coal measures, were originally on an l'A tellSive scale, but they have been removed by ero sion, and are now fOlind in only a few localities. The highlands bordering and partially inelosing the central plain have a more varWd character. In the northwest—in Donegal, Derry, Alayo, and the District of Connemara—the mountain axis consists of crystalline rocks, which give way on the flanks to upturned Paleozoic sediments. This structural type is repeated in the southeast, in the highlands of Leinster. The northern coun ties are floored largely by Silurian rocks. al though there are small areas where the Permian, Cretaecous, and Triassic formatioas outcrop. The Chines Causeway (q.v.) and the bold cliffs of the northern coast owe their (diameter to basalt intrusions. in the southwestern high lands the Old Bed Sandstone appears along the central ridges which are the axes of anticlinal folds, while the synclinal folds consist of Car boniferous limestone.