ON THE DESTRUCTION OF TROPICAL FORESTS. 91 



has been, if the forests are of so much importance as the agriculturists insist, 

 they must have a certain value to them, and they are at liberty to purchase 

 any tract they choose. But it is impracticable for the holders of land to 

 unite in making such a purchase; and were it at all practicable, the majority, 

 from ignorance and selfishness, would refuse to contribute. But climate con- 

 cerns the whole community, and its prohibition from injury is one of the duties 

 of Government. In Germany and France there are especial laws for the 

 protection and extension of forests*. It is not necessary to cite Humboldt or 

 Boussingault to prove the great influence in tropical regions of forests, and 

 especially mountain forests, in attracting and condensing clouds, diminishing 

 local temperature, and increasing humidity. But if tlie forests had no other 

 effect than to protect the clay soil of the mountains from the action of the sun's 

 rays, this ought alone to be sufficient to secure their careful preservation. It 

 is in this soil that the waters which supply all the streams of the island, and 

 which percolate downwards to the lower lands, are enclosed. These moun- 

 tains are, in fact, great natural reservoirs, elevated in mid-air and exposing 

 the most extended surfaces possible, which are covered to a small depth with 

 a sponge of porous decomposed rock, for the absorption and retention of 

 water. In ordinary seasons, when there is a considerable fall of rain, the im- 

 portance of preventing the contents of these reservoirs from being dissipated 

 may not be so obvious ; but it may now be considered a well-established fact 

 that the Eastern Archipelago is subject to periodical droughts, although the 

 laws of their recurrence are not yet ascei'tained. That such droughts will 

 again and again happen, and are in fact the settled course of nature, admits 

 of no question. 



" Nature, when left to herself, provides a compensatory influence in the 

 dense leafy forests ; but if these are consigned to destruction, every successive 

 drought will prove more baneful than the preceding. Unless Government 

 will reserve at least the steeper mountain tracts, which are not adapted for 

 permanent culture, there is nothing visionary in the apprehension, for it has 

 been realized in other localities, that in some prolonged droughts, after the 

 naked sides of the hills have been exposed to the direct heat of the sun, every 

 stream in the inland will be dried up, and universal aridity ensue. The 

 great extent to which the mainland of Penang has been shorn of its forests, 

 would of itself produce an urgent necessity for a stop being at once put to a 

 war with nature, which must entail severe calamities for the future. In those 

 mountains in Greece which have been deprived of their forests, the springs 

 have disappeared. In other parts of the globe the same consequence has 

 followed. The sultry atmosphere and dreadful droughts of the Cape de 

 Verd Islands are owing to the destruction of the forests. In large districts 

 of India, climate and irrigation have rapidly deteriorated from a similar cause, 

 and the Government having become fully impressed with the necessity of 

 respecting the stubborn facts of nature, every means have been used to avert 

 and remedy the mischief. Forests which had been so easily and thoughtlessly 

 cut down have at great cost been restored." 



We extract the following very interesting results of tree plantations, show- 



* They have the sar8e in all the Italian States. So far back as 1475 the subject attracted 

 the attention of the famous Venetian Council of X., by which a law was passed on the 7th of 

 January of that year, regulating in great detail the clearance of the forests on terra firma. 

 The mountain forests especially were protected by judicious regulations, which were renewed 

 from time to time down to the very year of the extinction of the old republics. Tuscany and 

 the Pontifical governments were equally provident. — IdrauUca Ragionata di Menyotti, p. 321 

 gt seq. 



