160 TEANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



timber-cutting by law, requiring trees to be planted when others are 

 removed. 



But Spain stayed not the woodman's ax, and her forests have 

 been swept away, and in a comparatively short space of time she has 

 been reduced from a first- to a third-rate power. And reading the 

 future by the past it will not be long before her sovereign will have 

 as little voice in the councils of nations as does the so-called ruler of 

 the land through which flows the Nile. 



But old despotic Russia has come nearer, perhaps, than any other 

 nation to solving the forestry question, at least they have reduced it 

 to some kind of system and keep a certain per cent, of their area in 

 timber. 



They not only plant forests if needed where the trees have been 

 removed, but are pushing out their plantations into the bald, wind- 

 swept steppes, well knowing that the leaves will heal these sick and 

 sore waste lands, on which no human can live, and make it a fit and 

 pleasant abiding place for man. 



But they do things there different from what we do, the power 

 behind the throne (or on it) says, plant so many acres of trees in 

 this or that province, and it is done; or this power says, build a rail- 

 road here, and a city there, and it is done without argument, qo 

 counter interest attempting to defeat the measure. So there is some 

 good even in a despotic government that an American citizen is 

 forced to acknowledge. 



The land system of Great Britain, though very faulty in a gen- 

 eral sense, has resulted in good in one particular at least: it has been 

 the means of keeping large tracts in forest for the preservation and 

 breeding of game, and all the people have been benefited by the 

 healing power of the leaves. 



But what can I say of our own country? I can say this, and 

 sorry I am to have to say it: We, as a nation, are following in the 

 footsteps of the ancient Egyptians and the Jews, as far as the de- 

 struction of timber is concerned. And unless we face about and 

 say, " thus far, and no farther, shalt thou go," and force the wood- 

 men, by stringent laws, to spare the trees, it is only a question of 

 time when the antiquarian will dig amid the ruins of New York, 

 Washington, Chicago and other large cities, and speculate on the 

 kind of civilization we possessed, living two thousand years after the 

 Christian era, and did not possess wisdom enough to preserve our 

 woodlands; did not know that the leaves of the trees were for the 

 healing of the nations. But in the absence of any adequate action 

 by our government, there are, and always have been, earnest, far-see- 

 ing individuals who have raised their voices against the self-destroy- 

 ing practice of denuding our mountains, hills and valleys of the cov- 

 ering nature placed there for a wise and beneficent purpose. 



There is one feature of the forestry question that I have never 

 been able to satisfactorily explain, even to my own mind. I refer to 



