16 REPORT ON THE TIMBERS OF THE 
cause I had seen in operation in the Black Mountains had 
completed its work in this part of the Purchase. 
I called on Mr. Waterfield, one of the oldest residents of 
this part of Kentucky, who lives about six miles from Mur- 
ray, for information. He told me that thirty years ago this: 
whole region of country was a perfect prairie, in which not a 
single bush was to be found, except along the streams, and 
that this result was due, as I had suspected, to the practice of 
burning off the woods yearly, in the late fall or early spring, 
for the sake of the ‘‘range.” This practice, when continued: 
year after year, produces two results, both of which I pointed 
out in speaking of the Black Mountain timbers: it kills off 
the old forest growth more rapidly than it would be re- 
moved by the ordinary agents, by burning and crisping the 
outer bark every year, and exposing the body of the tree 
to dampness and decay and the ravages of worms, and it de- 
stroys, every fall or spring, the bushes which have grown up 
since the preceding spring, and which have not yet attained 
sufficient size to withstand the heat. Evidently, if this pro- 
cess is kept up long enough, the old forest will have passed 
away, and no new one will have come on to take its place. 
Suppose this stage to have been reached over an extensive 
area of almost unwatered country: of course, during the next 
summer, after the last old tree had passed away and the 
young bushes had been burned down in the fall or spring, 
leaving the country absolutely bare, many other young bushes 
would spring up from seeds and roots still buried in the 
ground, and, if let alone, would form such a forest as we now 
see in this part of the Purchase. But if we suppose the pro- 
cess of burning to be continued year after year, it is evident 
that, before a great many years had passed, the last of the 
buried seeds would have sprouted, and the last root have 
exhausted itself and died. We should then have a vast ex- 
panse of country, not only without a tree or bush, but without 
a single seed or root from which one could come. Such are 
now the great prairie lands of the Western States, and such 
has been the cause which, in my opinion, led to their barren- 
152 
