FORESTRY AS RELATED TO THE FARM. 417 



are!" We replied: "Are we not your constituents?" "Oh, yes, of 

 course I want to please the ladies," he answered, and triflingly added, 

 "but you know the mosquitoes are too tb.ick !" Disregarding his 

 trifling remark, we said : "The women of Minnesota are desperately 

 in earnest in this matter. We represent ihe State Federation of 

 Women's Clubs, which has a membership of between six and seven 

 thousand, and you know that six or seven thousand women repre- 

 sent collectively six or seven thousand husbands and a few thousand 

 sons, who will possibly vote as their fathers vote. We grant you, 

 the mosquitoes are thick, but they could hardly disable you for your 

 congressional duties, but beware of setting six or seven thousand 

 bees buzzing in women's bonnets." And, strange to relate, the mer- 

 cury began to rise until the atmosphere was quite tropical. 



Some two weeks later, having retired from the field, we dared to 

 send a batch of petitions to this same member and received this 

 gracious answer: "Yours at hand, petitions submitted to the house 

 and referred to the committee on public lands, and I desire to 

 assure you if I can advance the interests of the forest reserve move- 

 ment in any way command my services at any time." Do not think 

 our interview with the member was intended to savor of intimidation. 

 W^e simply stated facts and gave a little kindly information. You 

 know a woman has no "axe to grind" ; she just speaks out what is 

 in her heart, and so sometimes it carries weight — being a club 

 woman, of course, it carried weight. Do not some present recall 

 the fact that to quiet the home guns and restore peace to the com- 

 munity, the voters had to sign our petition to Congress for the forest 

 reserve and write their Congressmen tO' support the Morris Bill ? 



As regards the work of the General Federation of Women's Clubs 

 in the matter of forestry, I would state that forestry was added to 

 our work only three years ago, but the committee questions if any 

 other department of the General Federation can show so great an 

 increase of interest during the three years as that of forestry. Thirty- 

 eight states have, where it was not already a department of work, 

 added forestry, and the committees are enthusiastically spreading the 

 propaganda of tree-planting, forest preservation and irrigation. Like 

 a prairie fire, interest among State Federations in national and state 

 movements for the preservations of large blocks of forests is spread- 

 ing and blazing up here and there, from the cypress groves of Cali- 

 fornia to the spruce clad slopes of New Hampshire. 



Forestry as apprehended in our work covers both arboriculture 

 and scientific forestry. A very general activity is manifest through- 

 out the length and breadth of the country in arboriculture, or tree- 

 planting for decorative purposes ; parks, cemeteries, school grounds. 



