176 FOREST PLANTING. 



island, and now farmers living four miles distant from 

 the coast complain that the sand borne inland by the 

 wind increases from year to year upon their fields, and 

 threatens to bury entire farms in the course of time. To 

 arrest these eifects, scientific forestry teaches us, first, to 

 prevent the shifting of the sand on the surface of the 

 dunes; and then to bind the loose soil so as to be able 

 to bear grasses, shrubs and later on, trees. Although 

 the dunes consist of the most infertile and mobile sand, 

 they have the peculiarity of absorbing and retaining, 

 especially in their elevated parts, much humidity; and 

 this peculiarity helps us greatly to control the drifting 

 sand ridges, by covering them with herbaceous and, even 

 with forest-growth, thus permanently binding them. 



Among the European nations, there is none that has 

 done more to resist the encroachments of blowing sands, 

 and to reclaim such wastes than France. The arresting 

 and reclaiming of the sand dunes along the Atlantic 

 Ocean, in the Departments of Gascony and Gironde is a 

 work which nowhere has been executed with more skill 

 and success. In consideration of the growing import- 

 ance of this subject in relation to our State, it may not 

 be out of the way to describe the particulars of this 

 operation a little more minutely. 



The operations for arresting the destructive effects of 

 the invasion of the sea-sand consist of (1) the erection 

 of palisades along the coast, by which the dunes situ- 

 ated in the rear are protected from the attacks of the 

 sea-wind and from being exposed to increased sand- 

 drifts and sand deposits ; (2) the work proper, for 

 binding the sand-dunes by aforestation. 



1. The magnitude of a performance of this kind 

 renders it necessary to operate in instalments. Usually 

 the place to be worked extends in length from 4,000 to 

 5,000 feet, and in depth or width about 1,000 feet. In 



