1883.] MODIFYING EFFECTS OF FORESTS. 123 



able results. Sir, the time was when the moral and physical 

 welfare — the rights and the liberties of the people — commanded 

 the care and attention of our legislatures ; we have departed from 

 the ways of the fathers; the legitimate consideration of those 

 high, those holy interests must give way to the grabbing, selfish 

 schemes of the day, even though it be at the expense of mortga- 

 ging in untold bonds the blood and sweat and treasures of those 

 who are to succeed us. The spirit of the fathers is hushed — 

 their institutions undermined — and last, though not least of all, 

 these forest treasures so essential to the use of man — to the moral, 

 physical, and material welfare of our race — become ruined and 

 squandered in the general scramble, by this fast, this reckless, this 

 prodigal generation, and we and our children, and their success- 

 ors, are left to inherit the barrenness, the desolation fixed upon us. 



Mr. Augur. There is one point in connection with this 

 subject, which has been presented to us so plainly, of such 

 very great importance that I would like to touch upon it. As 

 Boss Tweed said, " what are you going to' do about it ? " 

 Perhaps many of you will recollect that our Legislature, not 

 long ago, enacted a law for the encouragement of forest- 

 planting. I will not refer to it at any length, for you can all 

 learn what it is, if you do not already know ; but it exempts 

 land which is worth less than fifteen dollars an acre from 

 taxation for a period of ten years, provided it be planted with 

 certain varieties of forest trees. N.ow, I would like to make 

 just one point here, and only one. Nature is often her own 

 restorer, and if you will look at our census abstracts, you will 

 find that the amount of forest-land in Connecticut is increas- 

 ing. But the question is, what is it ? I am sorry to say, that 

 it is made up largely of land which is reverting back to forests 

 of such material as red cedar, white birch, some alder, and 

 perhaps poplar, and other kinds of inferior wood. 



Now, gentlemen, here is the point. Look at the encourage- 

 ment which our Legislature has offered. If we can take that 

 land which is likely to revert back to forest, and, instead of 

 letting it grow up to a cheap, trashy kind of wood, which is 

 not of much value, plant better kinds of timber, like white 

 oak, hickory, ash, and black walnut, where the land is suit- 



