SUMMER MEETING AT BROOKFIELD. 131 



HEALTH OF HOLT COUNTY. 



I quote the following from the very highest authority on the sub- 

 ject : 



After a residence of twenty-five years in Ohio and ten years in Illinois and 

 twenty years in this county, I can speak from comparison of these lecalities, and 

 say truthfully tbat Holt county is much freer from disease than any place I have 

 lived. About one-fifth of the county is bottom land, being the bottoms of the Mis- 

 souri and Nodaway rivers, and generally we have some malarial fevers the latter 

 part of summer and fall on the bottom lands ; but since the overflow of 1883 the 

 entire county has been almost entirely free from malarial diseases. In fact, we 

 have had no epidemics of any kind for many years. 



In an extensive practice of twenty years here, I find less scarlet fever, less 

 diphtheria and less summer diseases of children. While localities east of us are 

 being ravaged with epidemics of diphtheria and scarlet fever, we have here only 

 sporadic cases. Any one seeking a home in the west need have no fears of sick- 

 ness, for this county will be an improvement so far as health is concerned, to 

 almost any other country, especially to all places east or south of here. Four-fifths 

 of the county is upland prairie and timber, having fine drainage, being well sup- 

 plied with good pure water, a clear, dry atmosphere— all the essential elements to 

 make it a healthy country. A. GOSL1N, M. D. 



THE TIMBER. 



In the settling up of Holt county the grand old trees of the natural 

 forests were mostly slaughtered. Millions of rails were made from 

 walnut and burr oak trees of large size and of finest quality. Millions 

 of feet of lumber were cut from such trees and sold at about $8 per 

 1,000 feet. In many cases those trees, if left standing till now, would 

 sell on the stump for from two to five times as much as the farms from 

 which they were taken would bring to-day. As I pass those rails I 

 almost imagine I can hear them accuse the men who destroyed the old 

 patriarchs from which they were riven. 



The cord-wood fiend followed slow after the first horde of the 



vandals, and his hand is still heavy. A small pittance hardly earned is 



his reward, unless, indeed, waste, destruction and the seeming desert 



he leaves behind him are gain and pleasure to him. But nature seems 



in haste to hide the shame. Every stump sends up shoots or suckers, 



and these soon form a vigorous second growth of young trees covered 



with as varied and as beautiful a leafage as can be found in any county 



in the Union. The invention of barbed wire and the stock law have 



done much to save our forests. I will name some varieties in their 

 order as to quality: 



Cottonwood, mostly on the bottoms. 



Oaks — Black oak, red oak, burr oak, white oak and chestnut oak. 



Black walnut is plentiful and grows everywhere. 



