594 DUNES OF DENMARK. 
by thus improvidently sacrificing their most effectual safeguard 
acainst the drifting of the sands.* 
In 1589 a decree of Christian III., king of Denmark, im- 
posed a fine upon persons convicted of destroying certain spe- 
cies of sand-plants upon the west coast of Jutland. This ordi- 
nance was renewed and made more comprehensive in 1558, 
and in 1569 the inhabitants of several districts were required, 
by royal rescript, to do their best to check the sand-drifts, 
though the specific measures to be adopted for that purpose 
are not indicated. Various laws against stripping the dunes 
of their vegetation were enacted in the following century, but 
no active measures were taken for the subjugation of the 
sand-drifts until 1779, when a preliminary system of operation 
for that purpose was adopted. ‘This consisted in little more 
than the planting of the Arundo arenaria and other sand- 
plants, and the exclusion of animals destructive to these vege- 
tables.t Ten years later, plantations of forest trees, which have 
since proved so valuable a means of fixing the dunes and ren- 
dering them productive, were commenced, and have been con- 
tinued ever since.t During this latter period, Brémontier, 
without any knowledge of what was doing in Denmark, exper- 
imented upon the cultivation of forest trees on the dunes of Gas- 
cony, and perfected a system, which, with some improvements 
in matters of detail, is still largely pursued on those shores. 
* BERGSIE, Reventlovs Virksomhed, ii., p. 4. 
+ Measures were taken for the protection of the dunes of Cape Cod, in 
Massachusetts, during the colonial period, though I believe they are now sub- 
stantialy abandoned. A hundred years ago, before the valley of the Missis- 
sippi, or even the rich plains of Centraland Western New York, were opened 
to the white settler, the value of land was relatively much greater in New 
England than it is at present, and consequently some rural improvements 
were then worth making, which would not now yield sufficient returns to 
tempt the investment of capital. ‘The money and the time required to sub- 
due and render productive twenty acres of sea-sand on Cape Cod, would buy 
a ‘‘section” and rear a family in Illinois. The son of the Pilgrim, therefore, 
abandons the sand-hills, and seeks a better fortune on the fertile prairies of 
the West. See Dwieut, 7Z’ravels, i., pp. 92, 93. 
¢ ANDRESEN, Om Klitformationen, pp. 237, 240. 
