i 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



and there are some risks in importing trees which are avoided by pur- 

 chasing those which are home-grown. 



The Messrs. Douglas are probably the largest and most successful 

 raisers of forest-tree seedlings in the United States ; and, while they 

 are sending out trees by the million, for the encouragement of farmers 

 and others of small means who have had no experience in, planting, or 

 find it difficult to procure trees, at the suggestion of Professor Sargent, 

 of the Arnold Arboretum, they offer to send out dollar packages of 

 trees by mail, post-paid, to any part of the country. These packages 

 contain each from seventy-five to a hundred forest-trees. By this 

 means any one who has any interest in trees, or who would like to 

 make an experiment in growing them, may at trifling cost have them 

 delivered safely at his own door. Two years ago seventy-five thou- 

 sand trees were sent out in this way as a beginning, and not a single 

 one, it is said, failed to reach its destination in a good condition. 



It may be well to make one statement in regard to planting a par- 

 ticular class of trees. These are the evergreens, or the conifers, in- 

 cluding of course the larches. For shelter-belts on farms and by road- 

 sides, and for ornamental planting near dwellings, no trees are more 

 desirable. They commend themselves also for their bright-green foli- 

 age, holding on through the long winters which prevail over so large 

 a portion of the country. They have been less planted than is desir- 

 able, because planting them has so often resulted in failure. This has 

 come principally from not understanding the different nature of these 

 trees from that of all others. The sap of the pine family is resinous 

 and hardens whenever the bark of the roots becomes dried by exposure 

 either to the sun or the wind, and when once hardened no application 

 of water will dissolve it and set it flowing again. The tree is death- 

 struck. Nothing can save it. Hence the one important thing in trans- 

 planting evergreens, whether from their native woods or from the 

 nursery, is to keep the roots in a moist state until they are safely bed- 

 ded in the ground again. This is the secret of success. This done, 

 no trees are more easily or successfully managed. We would as soon 

 undertake to transplant a hemlock or a pine as a currant-bush. There 

 is no more need of failure with the one than with the other. 



We have assumed all along, if we have not directly asserted, that 

 the planting of trees on the large scale will be pecuniarily profitable, 

 while it is, on many accounts, so desirable. We turn to this point now, 

 however, more distinctly, because, although tree-planting is desirable 

 for the repair of the rapid waste of our existing forests and to main- 

 tain a supply of lumber for the various uses of life, indispensable in- 

 deed, and most important also in its bearings upon climate, agricult- 

 ural production, and upon all the industries and comforts of life, it 

 is the argument of pecuniary profit upon which we must chiefly rely 

 for any efficient action in the work of forestry. Nothing can be plainer, 

 to any one who looks at the subject in a comprehensive way, than that 



