296 TRANSACTIONS OF THE NORTHERN 



quired, and such products yielded by trees as can be had consistent 

 with the primary purpose of the soil, to yield those annual plants on 

 which man and his domestic animals depend. 



It is true that the woods alone cannot support mankind in a civil- 

 ized state. They must be taken off the soil, before his plantations and 

 cities can exist. But aside from the uses we have named, their value 

 is immensely great, on such portions of the earth's surface as his wants 

 do not demand should be cleared. In the great prairie states of Iowa 

 and Illinois it is especially necessary that the great deficiency of trees 

 should be overcome, and that they should be planted, or allowed to 

 grow undestroyd by fires. 



I wish especially to make an appeal to our farmers, and indeed to 

 every person who owns a square rod of the earth's surface. Tiie plant- 

 ing and culture of deciduous and coniferous trees is receiving too little 

 attention in the rural districts. I would have every inhabitant so alive 

 to this subject that they would realize the patent fact that every tree 

 planted, adds to the material wealth of the country. As a rule the 

 object of the farmer is to cultivate such crops as can most readily be 

 turned into money, but if all farmers in a given district should raise 

 only such products as they could annually exchange for money value, 

 the real wealth of that district would be little if any increased. 



Most happily for our country, a majority of our farmers look a 

 little further than for simply an annual income; and plant an orchard, 

 and about their buildings plant evergreens and deciduous trees for 

 ornament, shade, and protection, which in a few years add very much 

 to the value of their premises. 



While it is desirable for us in the main, to make our labor bring us 

 immediate returns, yet if every farmer would plant and cultivate his 

 grounds, with reference to their value fifty or a hundred years hence, 

 the resources of wealth to the country would be vastly augmented. 

 This is essentially true with reference to the culture of timber. There 

 is no farmer who could not devote one, three, five, or even ten acres of 

 his grounds to timber, and in a few years this would be the most valu- 

 able part of the farm. 



The importance of planting trees and groves of timber, will be 

 more forcibly realized when we look at the vast consumption of timber 

 for mechanical purposes and for fuel. 



In the monthly report of the department of agriculture for Novem- 

 ber and December, eighteen hundred and seventy, it is estimated " that 

 one hundred and fifty thousand acres of the best timber is cut every 

 year to supply the demand for railway sleepers alone. For railroad 

 buildings, repairs and cars, the annual expenditure in wood is thirty- 

 eight million dollars. In a single year the locomotives in the United 

 States consume fifty-six million dollars worth of wood. There are in the 

 whole country more than five hundred thousand artisans in wood; and 

 if the value of their labor is one thousand dollars a year, the wood in- 

 dustry of the country represents an amount of nearly five hundred mil- 

 lion dollars per annum." 



