50 AGEICULTUKAL REPORT. 



or of a portion of a State ; in the older States it is simply the result of 

 settlement and cultivation, in the destruction of forests, by clearing- 

 land for farms, for supplies of wood for fuel, in obtaining timber for 

 building and for the various uses of mechanism. East of the Allegha- 

 nies almost the entire surface of the laud was originally in forest. On 

 the very summit of the Alleghanies are comparatively large tracts of 

 level meadows, or mountain prairies, known as "glades," which are 

 found in undrained soils not suited to the growth of trees, though tliis 

 mountain-chain is generally wooded, on slope and summit, with as fine 

 and various an arborescent growth as can be seen in Sny part of the 

 North American continent. West of the mountains, through West 

 Virginia, Ohio, and Kentucky, there was little else than forest in the 

 times of the aborigines; and in Northeastern, Southern, and South- 

 western Indiana, a wooded surface was the prevailing characteristic, 

 and even now it is a favorite resort for obtaining black walnuts and 

 poplars of enormous size, and great boles of oaks, lit for the masts of 

 many a " man-of-war." The South was and is a wooded region, with 

 very few and small prairies in the valley of the Mississippi, and none 

 really worth mentioning until Central Texas is reached. In Northern 

 Missouri are extensive prairies, but almost half the area of the State is 

 now covered with forest, notwithstanding the extensive clearing of 

 farm-lands during more than fifty years since its settlement; and more 

 than half the surface of Arkansas and Louisiana, both west of the Mis- 

 sissippi, is now covered with wood. Meteorological records show that 

 the lines of equal moisture, in this section, run northeast and southwest, 

 through Western Kansas, Eastern Nebraska, Iowa, and Wisconsin ; the 

 records of the rain-fall of any given period correspond on that line, 

 rather than with a line through Kansas and Missouri ; so the rains of 

 central Nebraska and Minnesota, in i)oint of time and quantity, corre- 

 spond more nearly than those of Nebraska and Iowa. As might natu- 

 rally be expected^ we find the forest boundary, from Texas to Illinois, 

 beyond which the prairies stretch westward, running in a general di- 

 rection corresponding with the lines of equal rain-fall. As a result, 

 (though the lack of trees farther west cannot be attributed to insuffi- 

 cient rain-fall alone,) we find plains predominating in Western Texas, in 

 nearly all of the Indian Territory, in a strip of Western and nearly all 

 of Northern Missouri, in a large portion of Illinois, and in Western arid 

 Northern Indiana, nearly to Lake Erie. Southern Illinois has an aver- 

 age proportion of forest, as the accompanying outline map, with figures 

 giving the proportion of woodland to farm area, will show. The entire 

 area of farm-lands in Illinois, as reported by the last census, is 25,882,- 

 861 acres, of which 5,061,578 acres, or 19.6 per cent., were reckoned as 

 woodland. The belt south of the Ohio and Mississippi Eailroad has a 

 percentage of 43.5, which is greater than that of Missouri, and almost 

 equal to that of Virginia. These counties are as follows : 



Counties. 



Per 



ccut. 



Monrop 47. 1 



Wasbingtou 23.7 



Wayno 48.1 



Edwards 49.0 



Wabasli 40.7 



Randolph 53.3 



PeiTV 42.1 



Franklin 02.3 



Counties. 



Ter 

 cent. 



Hamilton 50. 4 



White 45.5 



Gallatin 56.8 



Saline 49.0 



Williamson 47. 3 



Jackson 50. 9 



Union .50, 7 



'Per 

 Ccuuties. ^.pjjj 



Johnson 00. 



Pope 61.0 



Hardin 61.3 



Massac 57. 



Pulaski 39.2 



Alexander 56, 2 



JcO'crson .■ 44. 2 



The district lying between this railroad and the fortieth parallel con- 

 tains twenty-nine counties, and averages 25 per cent, of woodland; and 

 is made n^ as follows : 



