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necessary for the farm. There are 1 ; 400,000 square miles of 

 treeless plains in the United States, which in due course of 

 time will necessarily be converted to a great extent into agri- 

 cultural areas on account of the generally excellent soil. The 

 locust tree is much chosen for shelter purpose. Denuded wood- 

 land of poor soil, left undisturbed to natural renovation, has 

 become in some populous localities five times as valuable as 

 the adjoining inferior tillage or pasture land. For the greatest 

 profit in fuel the trees in some parts of North America are cut 

 about every sixteen years. We here, commanding eucalypts, 

 acacias and casuarinas, would gain wood-harvests still speedier. 

 The increased value of less fertile lands through spontaneous 

 upgrowth of timber is estimated at -y^ of simple interest 

 annually in woodless localities, no labour being expended on 

 this method of wood-culture. Judicious management in 

 thinning-out enhances the value of such forest land still more. 

 Wet and undrairied grounds can be made to yield a return in 

 elms, willows, cottonwood, swamp cypresses and other swamp 

 trees, or stony declivities in pines and eucalypts, at a trifling 

 cost. For details, the forest literature, which is in Germany 

 particularly rich, should be studied. Capitalists would likely 

 find it safer and more profitable, to secure land for timber 

 growth, than to invest in many another speculation. After 

 the example set at Massachusetts, our agricultural societies 

 might award premiums and medals for the best timber planta- 

 tions raised in their districts. We have societies for the 

 protection of domestic animals, native or introduced birds, 

 young fish, &c.: why could not a strong and widely-spreading 

 league be organised for the saving of the native forests? Might 

 not every child in a school plant a memorial tree, to be 

 entrusted to its care, to awaken thus an interest in objects of 

 this kind at an early age 1 



Reverting to the importance of shelter, let me remark that 

 fifty years ago the peach flourished in North Pennsylvania, in 

 Ohio and New York, where it cannot any longer now be 

 grown, in consequence of the now colder and far more change- 

 able climate, after the forests became extensively removed. 

 Even ordinary orchards and cereal fields suffer there now. 

 Yet poor land will yield a better return in wood than in corn 

 crops, and it is not too much to say, that the favourable effect 

 of a young forest on climate may be felt already after a dozen 

 years. Even on ordinary sheep-runs trees are of the greatest 

 importance both for shelter and shade. 



Having endeavoured to explain forest value as it presents 



