20 



.5,000,000, and this is regarded as the mere sequence of the 

 removal of the forests, and not traceable to exhaustive culture. 

 Cereal crops and vines were destroyed in many parts of South 

 Europe also, through the complete want of shelter. 



" More bleak to view the Mils at length recede, 

 And less luxuriant, smoother vales extend ; 

 Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed 

 Far as the eye discerns, without an end." 



BYRON. 



The Commissioner of the Lands Office of the United States 

 (Report for 1868) considers the live oak (Quercus virens) 

 one of the best for ship-building nearly exterminated for 

 all practical purposes, at least as far as native forests are con- 

 cerned; while the walnut timber of North America, so much 

 prized for cabinet-work, has well-nigh shared the same fate. 

 The transit of walnutwood from Missouri to New York 

 renders it already nearly as expensive as mahagoni, whereas 

 the latter has become likewise in West India and Central 

 America an article of great scarcity, and therefore this impor- 

 tant tree should be copiously planted in the forests of tropical 

 Australia. In the earlier part of this century the supply of 

 Saul timber of Lower India (Shorea robusta) was thought 

 inexhaustible; but now already this heavy and durable wood 

 is hardly any longer procurable for ship-building and engi- 

 neering work, for which it is so much sought. The axes of 

 the woodmen will also soon make such an inroad into the 

 comparatively limited yarrah forests of West Australia, that 

 also this timber, which for saltwater works is almost incom- 

 parable, will cease to be available long before a new and 

 sufficient supply can be raised by regular culture. 



The Lands Commissioner of the United States further 

 reports, in 1868, that the frequent excessive droughts, and the 

 occasional destructive inundations experienced a quarter of a 

 century ago in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, have much 

 diminished since the regular settlement brought tree planta- 

 tions and other cultures into the extensive treeless prairies. 

 Iowa planted in 1867 about 76 square miles of forest, and 

 1884 miles length of hedges. On the other hand, it is esti- 

 mated already, in 1864, by Mr. P. T. Thomas, of New York, 

 that the whole regions east of the Mississippi would be 

 stripped of all really useful timber within twenty or thirty 

 years; while even for fuel great inroads are constantly made 

 into the American forests, coal not being everywhere accessible 



