' WHY WE SHOULD EXTEND OUR FOREST RESERVES. 415 
“And that leads me to say in concluding this hasty note, that you good 
people of Minnesota have within your own present power this very winter, 
an opportunity to preserve and reclaim for your own state and its people, 
now living and to come hereafter, the grandest region of forests, lakes, rivers 
and streams (considering its accessibility, and inutility for other practical 
purposes) to be found in our country. And all you need to do to accom- 
plish it is to make your wishes known to your representatives in the na- 
tional congress. 
“Tf the Minnesota delegation in congress this winter shall unanimously 
ask that the federal government set apart as a national park, or forest re- 
serve, what are known as the Chippewa Reservations around Leech, Cass 
and Winnebigoshish lakes, (comprising some 830,000 acres, of which more 
than one-quarter is covered by the lakes, rivers and streams), you will have 
the nucleus in your own state of what is destined to become the grandest 
forest reserve for the plain people of America to be found within our bor- 
ders; and you will have it established, too, before the next century is three 
‘months old.” 
OUR DEFORESTED ACRES AND THEIR PROBABILITIES 
C. A. SCHENCK, PH. D., BILTMORE, N. C. 
Political economy seems to be a study to which our average congress- 
‘man does not devote much time. One of the foremost laws of political econ- 
omy neglected by our legislators demands: ‘Husband all resources of the 
country, all production being stopped when they cease’’— and produce we 
anust, if we want to live. 
Originally all products are taken from the soil, gold, iron and coal, 
wheat, corn, cotton, meat, timber in all its forms, etc., etc. It is the soil, 
therefore, the productiveness of which must be maintained. 
I do not intend to speak of the gradual exhaustion brought about by 
our present agricultural systems. We shall adopt the soil fertilizing methods 
of Europe as soon as we shall be compelled to do so, not earlier, and perhaps 
dt is economically wise to so proceed. The fact that millions of acres lie 
idle in the northwest and in the south which once were productive—pro- 
ductive of timber—is the point I am driving at. Here we have to deal with 
a national calamity. Every acre of deforested land can annually produce 
from 150 to 300 feet b. m. of timber, worth from 15 cents to 60 cents. The 
‘tharvest and conversion of the timber into commodities would, per acre per 
annum, put from $1.50 to $6.00 into the pocket of the wage earner. As the 
matter lies, we lose a big resource and a chance to earn wages on it. Whose 
fault is it this wastefulness, this destruction, this economic sin? Certainly 
not the wood owners! He would much rather stick to the land and raise a 
second crop, if such continuation of the forest would pay as well or better 
than forest destruction. 
As a matter of fact, forest destruction pays best, and for that reason 
the business man practices forest destruction. He cannot change economic 
conditions. It is beyond his power to make conservative use of his land 
more remunerative than forest destruction. The people can, but the people 
do not care to bring about the change. The people know that forestry 
‘is a most desirable undertaking, but they do not care to make it a re- 
‘munerative undertaking and, therefore, will never have it until, as Governor 
