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ec gS OF THE TRADEWATER REGION. 17 
mate in winter—they break the cold, bleak winds that sweep 
over the country, and give it protection in that way; and they 
add actual warmth to it from what I believe to be the fact, 
that the temperature of a living tree never falls quite so low 
as that of the surrounding atmosphere in exceedingly cold 
weather. Let the difference be ever so slight, where a coun- 
try is thickly studded with trees, each one a very little warmer 
than the atmosphere about it, the effect of the whole upon 
the climate will be very appreciable. In summer, too, where 
millions of trees are drawing up water from their deeply-set 
roots to be evaporated from the leaves, the atmosphere must 
always be more moist and pure than it would be were it to 
receive no such water supply to give back in dews at night. 
This moisture prevents, to some extent, the long droughts to 
which a country without forests is subject, and, added to the 
purity of an air washed in fresh dews nightly, tends to prevent 
the violent storms of wind and lightning which result from a 
long heated and impure atmosphere. I am well aware that 
Mr. Meehan, and others equally profound and scholarly, argue 
that ‘‘forests are the result, not the causes of climate,’’ and I 
am also aware that there are many obvious facts which point, 
in a certain degree, to that conclusion. Thus, for instance, 
one might mention the difference between a tropical forest 
and that of a temperate or frigid climate, or even point to the 
difference between timbers at different heights, and therefore 
different temperatures, on the same mountain. Such argu- 
ments, however, only go to show that certain timbers are best 
adapted to certain climates, and that originally there would be 
no forest at all on a piece of ground not naturally adapted to 
a forest growth, or that whatever forest did appear, would be 
the one best adapted to the soil, temperature, and other con- 
ditions of growth. But they by no means show, or tend to 
show, that a given wide range of country would be exactly the 
same, so far as climate is concerned, whether it were barren 
or covered with heavy forests. This subject, in its details, 
however, even were it properly a part of my discussion, is too 
complicated for further notice, and demands more investiga- 
£19, 
