ANNUAL MEETING AT NEVADA. 187 



Stand on the hills across either rivers from Pittsburg, and see the 

 stifling, poisoned smoke rising from the multitude of the great chimneys 

 of the furnaces, foundries, factories and shops, and from the dwellings of 

 that large city. Go among the acres of ovens where coal is burned into 

 coke, and see and smell the gases, the sulphur, and the ammonia 

 driven into the atmosphere in such quantities that the light of day is at 

 times obscured over whole regions. Go, see and smell at the places 

 where the sewers of a city are emptied. Among the fairest, freshest 

 scenes out in the countr}- your nose will warn you when you come near 

 a heap of decaying vegetation, or a putrefying animal. Think that such 

 gases, poisons and stenches are rising into the atmosphere from every 

 acre of city or country all over the world. Sum up all these and then 

 imagine something as to what a fearful load of deadly poison and of 

 nauseous filth goes every day into what we call our pure fresh air. Ah, 

 if all this went on and there were no leaves, this globe would soon be 

 again in such condition that neither human beings nor any animal could 

 exist on its surface. 



The force of gravity of course brings down very much that is me- 

 chanically forced upward by the heated air and the ascending smoke; 

 but the gases rise here and there and everywhere and refuse to fall upon 

 tlie soil, but float in the air and are only reduced by the leaves. 



The little leaf, whether nestling Close to the ground as part of some 

 small plant, or swinging high in the air from the topmost twig of some 

 tall tree, is standing guard between the soil and the clouds, and all is 

 well. 



As time passes, will there not be a purer air, an elevated human 

 race, a higher order of everything ? 



What will the leaf of the future be and what will be its work ? 



I have seen the fierce prairie fires of Illinois, Iowa and Kansas, lick 

 up the heavy coat of grass, destroying in a moment the growth of a 

 season; nay, not altogether destroying, for part was sent into the air and 

 part was left as the annual tribute to the soil, gathered in and laid 

 down by the leaves of the wild grasses. 



In many places in California, Oregon and Washington, have I been 

 among the great fir forests, where the trees stood from three hundred, 

 to four hundred feet above me; where, for thousands of acres, the sun 

 had never seen the ground for centuries. As bushes they had com- 

 menced making their deposits, and now as great trees they were drop- 

 ping each year tons of leaves upon every acre of it. A foot below the 

 last fallen leaves was the leaf mold formed perhaps before Columbus 

 found the unknown continent. 



