308 Forestry Quarterly. 



which leads time and again to this result, should be made a crime with 

 penalties that would deeply touch the sensitive pocket nerve. 



Speaking of the conditions surrounding the development of 

 water powers, he says : 



"I mention these examples (of failures) because I have noted in some of 

 the recent conservation talk an idea that the flow of almost any river or 

 stream of rapid descent could be easily transmuted into a never-ending 

 flow of gold. 



"The same glowing accounts fail to discover what use could be made 

 of such vast amounts of power in these remote localities, and they utterly 

 ignore questions of market in reckoning value. 



"Ridicule and distrust are the proper reward for those who put forth 

 these unqualified statements." 



Note, however, how even the sane, matter-of-fact engineer falls 

 a victim to his esthetic feelings : 



"While the scenic value of water has received too scant attention in 

 the work of the engineer, it is at« the hands of the lumbermen and the 

 early mill builders that it has suffered most. The dismal swamps, and 

 the ghostly ruins of trees that were killed by dam building in the Adiron- 

 dacks and in Northern Maine, have made such raw spots in the memories 

 of those of us who love the forest and its lakes that we sympathize with 

 the purpose of the constitutional restrictions which this State of New 

 York has interposed against the flooding of its forest lands by storage 

 reservoirs." 



As if it were necessary to make the surroundings unsightly 

 when constructing such reservoirs ! 



Another speaker, C. W. Baker, M. E., discusses the waste of our 

 natural resources by fire, pointing out that the loss in buildings 

 and their contents was $215,000,000 in 1907, or $2.50 per capita, 

 as against 12 to 49 cents in European countries. He naturally 

 rails against forest fires and concludes as we have always con- 

 cluded : 



"What I most want to make clear to you is that unless and until you 

 create in every forest State of the Union effective laws and effective or- 

 ganization to prevent forest fires — unless and until you do that thing — all 

 our talk of conserving the forests is vain. We cannot get away from 

 economic laws. We cannot expect a man to preserve valuable woodlands 

 uncut when at any time a forest fire may wipe out the property entirely. 

 And the higher the price of lumber goes, the greater the inducement to cut 

 off the trees. 



"Thus the more our forests dwindle and the nearer the inevitable timber 

 famine approaches, the more certain we make it that all the forests shall 

 disappear. If a man could hold his timber lands like other property for a 

 higher price without risk of total loss, many would prefer to do this, and 

 many would be found to undertake timber culture ; but, so long as timber 

 properties are subject to grave risk of total loss, they cannot be attractive 

 to capital. 



