FOREST DESTRUCTION BY FIRE. 67 



Pino belt, and when settlements are made within the White Pine Zone 

 the open meadow hinds are universally chosen. 



We come now to the most destructive of all the means used in exter- 

 minating the forests not alone of the Cuuir d'Alene region, but of the 

 Pacific Slope in general— the element of tire. The forest tires of the far 

 West are very different affairs from those that ravage the upper Mis- 

 sissippi Valley or the Eastern States. Did they carry with them the 

 same menace to life, Ave should soon see concerted efforts to abate 

 the evil. Forest fires have always raged in the Cu-ur d'Alenes. The 

 oldest growth of forest shows blackened stumps buried under the 

 accumulated debris of centuries. When one digs down in the soil 

 charred wood is often turned up from the depth of 1 meter (40 inches) 

 or more. The forests of the past were doubtless fired in the main by 

 the Indians, accidentally or purposely, or both. The areas, however, 

 which were burned over each season were insignificant; in most sec- 

 tions fires manifestly did not occur during centuries. 



The action of the fires in each of the forest zones is in a manner 

 peculiar to each section, depending upon the means whereby it spreads. 

 Its destructiveness, always considerable, is proportional to the amount 

 of humus which covers the ground and to the free or interrupted 

 access of a draft or wind. The fires of the White Pine belt are by far 

 the most destructive from every point of view and very much more 

 numerous. Owing to its sheltered situation, the progress of fire is 

 here slow. It is not difficult to walk away from a fire as it advances. 

 One can ride through a burning forest, as I have done many times, and 

 suffer no other inconvenience than a covering of ashes and dust. A 

 slight amount of clearing around a cabin or house is ample protection. 

 It only becomes dangerous in the rare instances when a high wind tans 

 the fiames, or when the fire runs through an area previously burned 

 over on which the dead timber is down. It then sometimes creates 

 a strong draft or suction of its own. which sends the fiames through 

 the forest at great speed and annihilates everything in its way. Such 

 instances are rare, and the fury of the sea of flame is soon over. The 

 quiet and slow burning is the rule, and but for the volumes of ascend- 

 ing smoke an observer at a distance would not suspect the perhaps 

 near presence of a great forest lire. 



The fire in the White Pine belt spreads principally by burning the 

 humus. There is a covering of this material ranging from i cm. (1.6 

 inches) in depth to 50 en. (20 inches) or more. This rarely burns with 

 a flame. It is a process of slow incineration of the mass at a red heat. 

 If the fires ran through the forest with the same speed as in the East, 

 every vestige of timber would have been swept off long since. After 

 the fire has once obtained a firm lodgment in the humus it becomes an 

 exceedingly difficult matter to extinguish it. 1 have known it to burn 

 continuously for two months under the snow. As the line of inciner- 

 ation spreads through the forest, it encounters the roots of the trees. 



