Destruction and Deterioration 97 



revolution in the condition of the land has been 

 wrought which offers to the forester and the legis- 

 lator perhaps the most difficult forestry problem 

 anywhere in the world. Rarely did the lumberman 

 bother himself about the future supply of timber, 

 or its reproduction. The most he did was, in the 

 early days when small logs were not salable, to 

 leave uncut trees of less than twelve inches. To- 

 day he goes over the same lands and takes what he 

 left thirty years ago, this time down to the " pole " 

 of eight inches and less in diameter. This is what 

 is misnamed second-growth timber in many parts of 

 Maine and the Northwest. 



These methods were rough, no doubt, and appar- 

 ently irrational. Yet there was an excuse for it. 

 Lumbermen did not do business for the benefit of 

 posterity or for the general good. Their only ob- 

 ject was to reap the largest possible profit in the 

 shortest possible time. They were in the same 

 condition of mind with practically the whole people 

 when they gave no thought to managing their forest 

 property in such a way as to provide for a repro- 

 duction of their crop. That the whole people were 

 regardless of such provision is shown by the fact 

 that in all legislation touching the public lands, 

 their disposal and protection, the maintenance of 

 the forests growing thereon was, until within a very 

 few years, absolutely lost sight of. 



It is, then, the lumbermen no more than the set- 

 tlers who must bear the chief blame for the deteri- 

 oration and unnecessary destruction of American 



