52 The Bulletin. 



ward to the sea an increased load of silt, loam and plant nutriment from 

 lands prostituted through greed and ignorance and from which every rain 

 removes a portion of the finest and richest of the soil — that portion of the 

 surface which has received the care of past generations, upon which all the 

 agencies of soil building have been at work, into which we have lavishly 

 poured fertilizers — leaving behind barren wastes. 



"The ravages committed by man," writes Marsh, "subvert the relations and 

 destroy the balance which Nature has established between the organized and 

 the inorganic creations, and she avenges herself upon the intruder by letting 

 loose upon her defaced provinces destructive energies hitherto kept in check 

 by organic forces destined to be his best auxiliaries, but which he has unwisely 

 dispersed and driven from the field of action. When the forest is gone the 

 great reservoir of moisture stored up in its vegetable mould is evaporated and 

 returns only in deluges of rain to wash away the parched dust into which 

 that mould has been converted. The well-wooded and humid hills are turned to 

 ridges of dry rock, which encumbers the lowgrounds and chokes the water 

 courses with its debris, and the whole earth, unless rescued by human art 

 from the physical degradation to which it tends, becomes an assemblage of 

 bald mountains, of barren, turfless hills scarred with gullies. There are parts 

 of Asia Minor, of Northern Africa, of Greece and of Alpine Europe where the 

 operation of causes set in action by man has brought the face of the earth to a 

 desolation almost as complete as that of the moon ; and though within that 

 brief space of time which we call "the historical period" they are known to 

 have been covered with luxuriant woods, verdant pastures and fertile meadows, 

 they are now too far deteriorated to be reclaimed by man, nor can they be- 

 come again fitted for human use, except through great geological changes or 

 other mysterious influences or agencies of which we have no present knowl- 

 edge or over which we have no present control. The earth is fast becoming 

 an unfit home for its noblest inhabitant, and another era of equal human 

 crime and human improvidence and with like duration with that through 

 which traces of that crime and that improvidence extend, would reduce it to 

 such a condition of impoverished productiveness, of shattered surface, of 

 climatic excess, as to threaten the deprivation, barbarism and perhaps even 

 the extinction of the species." 



As a nation we slowly begin to realize the prodigality with which we have 

 wasted and destroyed our natural resources. Our crime has not been that of 

 burying our talents in the ground, but of destroying the ground itself. 



President Roosevelt called a conference of Governors who met at the White 

 House in May, 1908, and issued the following declarations : 



"We, the Governors of the States and Territories of the United States of 

 America, in conference assembled, do hereby declare the conviction that the 

 great prosperity of our country rests upon the abundant resources of the land 

 chosen by our forefathers for their homes, and where they laid the foundation 

 of this great Nation. 



"We look upon these resources as a heritage to be made use of in establish- 

 ing and promoting the comfort, prosperity and happiness of the American 

 people, but not to be wasted, deteriorated, or needlessly destroyed. 



"We agree that our country's future is involved in this; that the great 

 natural resources supply the material basis upon which our civilization must 

 continue to depend, and upon which the perpetuity of the Nation itself rests. 



"We agree, in the light of the facts brought to our knowledge and from 

 Information received from sources which we cannot doubt, that this material 

 basis is threatened with exhaustion. Even as each succeeding generation 

 from the birth of the Nation has performed its part in promoting the progress 

 and development of the Republic, so do we in this generation recognize it as 

 a high duty to perform our part; and this duty in large degree lies in the 

 adoption of measures for the conservation of the natural wealth of the country. 



"We declare our firm conviction that this conservation of our natural re- 

 sources is a subject of transcendent importance, which should engage unre- 

 mittingly the attention of the Natioh, the States, and the people in earnest 

 co-operation. These natural resources include the land on which we live and 

 which yields our food ; the living waters which fertilize the soil, supply power, 



