METHODS AND PROFIT OF TREE-PLANTING. 15 



there is coming an increased demand for wood, for use as fuel and in 

 the various arts and industries, while the sources of supply will be less- 

 ened for a long time to come, whatever may be done to increase them. 

 The existing forests, which we are sweeping off so rapidly with the 

 axe and by fire, have been the growth, some of them, of centuries. 

 They can not be replaced in this generation or the next. In some 

 cases they can not be replaced at all. Meantime the destruction of 

 what are left will continue. It is estimated that the great lumber 

 region of Michigan and Wisconsin will be swept of its timber in ten 

 years more. The increasing millions of our population will make in- 

 creasing demands upon the forests. With all that we may do in plant- 

 ing there is likely to come a scarcity of lumber and of timber for pur- 

 poses of construction which will carry the price far beyond anything 

 which we now know, and make woodlands mines of wealth to their 

 owners. 



But comparatively few take such a large view of things ; or, if 

 they do, have the forecast and resolution to act upon it. It is the con- 

 sideration of present gain or loss which moves most men to action. 

 And, regarded in this light, the subject of tree-planting is one which 

 commends itself to almost all land-owners. Apart from the rich prai- 

 ries of the West, there is hardly a farm, we may say, upon which there 

 is not. some portion so swampy, so rocky and inaccessible, or so poor 

 in soil, that the cultivation of the ordinary crops upon it is impracti- 

 cable or unprofitable. Such portions are now properly called waste- 

 lands. But there ought to be no waste-lands. There need be none. 

 These intractable portions of many of our farms, now bearing only a 

 scanty and often well-nigh worthless growth, may, with little trouble, 

 be planted with valuable trees, which, even in a few years, will yield a 

 profitable return from their proper thinning, while those that may be 

 left will increase in value as certainly and as rapidly as money depos- 

 ited in a savings-bank or invested in the public funds. The farmer or 

 land-owner can hardly provide for his children so easily as in this way 

 a sure and valuable legacy. A distinguished authority has said, " As 

 a general rule, in the highlands and lowlands of Scotland, land under 

 wood, at the end of sixty years, under good management, will pay the 

 proprietor nearly three times the sum of money that he would have 

 received from any other crop on the same piece of ground." 



Nothing is better understood in England and on the Continent than 

 that the forests are among the best and surest sources of income. 

 Governments and great corporations regard them as stable and impor- 

 tant means of revenue. In our own country, as yet, we have not 

 become accustomed to look upon the forests in this aspect. Nor have 

 we cared for them as we do for those things which we depend upon 

 for revenue. And yet, neglected as our woodlands have been, and 

 left to take care of themselves, they have yielded a fair pecuniary 

 return. There is no reason why, with good management, they should 



