STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 147 



bones of a piratical and suicidal policy that recklessly fells the mountain 

 forests and dismantles the hills — converting the cooling streams of plenty 

 into a dry and parched land, and making the ambrosial meadows a des- 

 ert ? Let an}^ longeared skeptic — if any such can be found — take a posi- 

 tion under a redwood tree for a few moments in a foggy da}'", and feel 

 the rain — none of your Scotch mist moisture, but a real, genuine, pouring 

 shower — come down upon his back, and it will do his mind as much good 

 as ever pump did lunatic. Mr. Eldridge, who lives on a branch of the 

 San Leandro Creek, in this vicinity, informs us that the springs around 

 the Redwoods gave out as the woods disappeared ; he is wiser now, and 

 cherishes and protects the young growth more reverently. 



It is painful to see even water companies, who ought to know at least 

 their immediate interests, clearing away or allowing to be destroyed 

 every vestige of protection to their water supplies — a course that in a 

 few years will inevitably prove their utter ruin. Can it be possible in 

 their avarice they grudge the servants the scant draught that enables 

 them to serve? when the truth is, even their shadow has a thousandfold 

 more sense in it. As the forest-clad mountains are the natural sources 

 of all good to man, so they are the true poetical and sacred symbols of 

 it; they are the very fountainheads of our love of liberty and sense of 

 the beautiful, and thence intelligence; and when they, like the affections 

 of the human heart, disappear, there also disappears the good genius of 

 the people. Poverty, forever, let it be remembered, keeps pace with the 

 desti'uction of the woods. The forests are the breasts of the rivers, that 

 run like the life-giving arteries of the human body to their great ocean 

 heart, and in turn again rise in vapor upon the wings of the wind ; and 

 these clouds, in an everlasting gyre, are condensed by the woods to rain, 

 and as they are duly distributed draw and disperse the showers equally. 



God has given to man the power, in a marvellous degree, to moderate 

 his clime, soften the fierce winds and biting frosts, temper the burning 

 ardor of the sun, say to the drifting sand and whelming flood, '-thus 

 far;" and with sweet pleasure provide for generations health, wealth, 

 and blessings innumerable — makiniy even the desert to blossom as the 

 rose. 



We have neither taste, time, nor space to dwell much upon details; 

 but let us for a single moment look and listen to the lessons of wisdom 

 which history teaches. Let us consider whether one of the gi'eatest of 

 social interests shall be longer left to shift for itself, and the wild boar 

 out of the forest shall forever lay waste the beautiful heritage of unborn 

 millions? To-day, by the wanton destruction of their woodlands, lie in 

 ruins a great part of France, Spain, Italy, and especially Crreece. In 

 the days when Homer sang they had the climate of Germany, and Ger- 

 many that of Sweden ; and when there was a real Ca)sar in France, 

 olives could only grow south of forty-seven degrees; three hundred 

 years after, as far north as the Loire, and now in Paris. All they seem 

 to lack to make it a complete burning desert is a few more lumbermen 

 and a little more energetic imitation of American enterprise. The 

 modern terrific and devastating floods of the Rhone are reported by a 

 Goverment commission to be due to this cause. Many are the doleful 

 details that language is not dismal enough to describe which we could 

 cite — actually depopulating vast districts — but we forbear. On precip- 

 itous mountains the woods should be untouched, as they detain the 

 waters and moderate excessive rain falls, preserving a salutary equilib- 

 rium; but, if bare, the storms rush down disintegrated rocks, sand, and 

 debris, spreading abroad a sterile expanse only tit for the wolfish sedge 



