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farm. This reduces our debt to $68.30. This we will compound for two years more, and 

 we are debtor to $76.73. At this time, twelve years from setting, we propose to remove 

 one-half of the whole original number, which gives us 1,360 trees. These, at the very lowest 

 estimate, are worth 2b cents per tree, or $340 for the lot ; from this amount deduct our 

 indebtedness, and we have a credit of $263.27. We will now compound this for four 

 years more, and our credit is $332.35. To this amount we will add $50 for the land 

 charged to us sixteen years ago, and as it is none the worse we will take it at its former 

 appraisement. This further increases our balance to $382.35. Now we propose to close 

 the account, and sell the one-fourth yet remaining — 680 trees. These are worth a dollar 

 a tree ; from this, however, I must deduct the interest on the land for the last four years, 

 which is $13.12. That leaves a net profit of $1,049.23. But suppose I am told that my 

 last lot of trees are not worth a dollar apiece. To this I reply that 1 know of quite a 

 number of Gatalpa speciosa about that age, and for all such trees well-grown and within 

 twenty miles of my farm I will give a dollar each and go after them. The catalpa in 

 University Square, Indianapolis, have been set about sixteen years, and average one foot 

 from the ground about one inch in diameter for every year of growth, and notwithstand- 

 ing they have not been crowded so as to give them the most desirable shape, yet, if the 

 city authorities wish to dispose of them I will take them at the above figure and be glad 

 of the chance. Of course $25 would not move one of them, but as this is not their com- 

 mercial value it cannot be used as a basis of calculation. 



Forty years of experience as a tree-planter has taught me that trees do not always 

 grow where they are set precisely as desired or indicated ; but, as the catalpa transplants 

 with a remarkable degree of certainty — even growing without roots — -I believe on good 

 ground it is within the scope of practical demonstration to realize three-fourths of the 

 result above indicated; but should one-half be attained we have $524.61 as the return 

 from one acre of land for sixteen years, and all this with very little labour or expense 

 after the setting and three or four years cultivation at the beginning, after which they 

 require no further care. 



As to the question of the commercial demand I have no idea that it can be supplied 

 in half a century, but so far as I am concerned with my little plantation it is for the 

 necessities of my own farm. Every farmer should have a few acres of well-grown catalpa 

 or locust from which to draw for the thousand and one demands of the farm, [f we fence- 

 at all, I believe the coming fence will have posts. Just what this fence will be I cannot say ; 

 it may be boards, iron, steel — at all events it will require posts, and these posts should be 

 as durable as possible, and catalpa being the best now known for that purpose will be in 

 demand. But as I promised not to argue the demand for durable timber, allow me to 

 refer to the demand for railroad cross-ties, piles for trestles, bridges and embankments, as 

 well as telegraph poles, all affording an immense field for the use of this wood. 



I have occasionally referred to the Black Locust. T am aware that it is not reliable 

 in some sections of the United States ; especially is this true of most of our western 

 prairies, but in the timbered regions it generally succeeds, and on my own farm in a small 

 plantation made some twenty-one years ago I am now realizing an actual profit, clear of 

 all expense, of over $400 per acre. 



There is a mystery about the growth of the Black Locust which I do not understand. 

 I saw beautiful, thrifty, isolated specimens of it in southern Kansas and the Indian 

 Territory, but wherever it had been set in quantities in the places above named it had in 

 every instance been destroyed by the borer, and yet fifty or sixty miles south of Baxter 

 Springs in Kansas, it is a beautiful forest tree with a body often fifty to sixty feet in 

 length. 



There is another feature of timber culture for profit which I have not mentioned, and 

 that is the supply for those vast western prairies where land can be had for the planting, 

 and in some instances, I believe, an exemption from taxes if planted to timber. The 

 field for enterprise here is incalculable, the demand without limit, and yet the investment 

 comparatively trifling. It is true the risks are more and greater. These are mainly 

 drouth, grasshoppers, and fire. 



The catalpa where fairly established might pass through a season without rain, but 

 should the drouth immediately succeed the setting, the result would most likely be a total 



