Cost of Evergreen Seedlings. 253 



personally used in each of the last three years, between forty and 

 fifty thousand seedlings, chiefly White Pine. I must make ar- 

 rangements early for obtaining my planting stock, and Mr. Hill's 

 catalogue was sent me when I was looking up quotations for my 

 1908 supply. The first page of that catalogue states: "The fall 

 gives us plenty of time in which to handle your business. There- 

 fore we can afford to sell your stock at a better figure than in the 

 spring of the year, when the season is short and we are forced to 

 go at a terrific pace to keep up with the work. When fall planting 

 is employed all is changed. We can go ahead and take care of 

 your orders as they come, and give them our best and most careful 

 attention." Under these circumstances, it seemed hardly worth 

 while to write for lower quotations than $8.00 per thousand for 

 White Pine. I do not think that I ever had another price list 

 from Mr. Hill. If his general scale of prices has been incorrectly 

 given, the fault would seem to be his own in sending out lists with 

 different scales. 



2. That I have understated the cost of growing seedlings. Here 

 I have also given my authority, viz: a forthcoming bulletin of 

 the Division of Forestry. If Mr. Hill disagrees with the Division, 

 his quarrel must be with it and not with me. I have no doubt that 

 your paper will be glad to have from Mr. Hill a careful and de- 

 tailed statement of the items making up such cost. I may say, 

 however, that I have recently received a letter from Mr. C. R. 

 Pettis, State Forester of New York, in which he says that the 

 figures I quoted "are those I prepared for the Bulletin which I 

 have written" for the Division. Mr. Pettis may not have been 

 growing seedlings as long as Mr. Hill, but his figures will 

 probably be accepted as authoritative by most of your readers. 



3. That I have minimized the amount of forest planting now 

 being done, and the amount of capital invested in the business of 

 supplying that demand. Upon this subject Mr. Hill is undoubt- 

 edly a much better authority than I, and it is to be regretted that 

 he did not see fit to give more definite figures in his reply to my 

 article. Did he, or did he not, for instance, as stated in his letter 

 submitted to the Ways and Means Committee of the House of 

 Representatives, have on hand 200,000,000 evergreen seedlings for 

 forest planting? Shortly after the date of that letter, I find his 

 advertisement in the Rural New Yorker (January 30, 1909), stat- 

 ing: "We have 50,000,000" — evergreens. In the absence, there- 



