of the famished cattle and sheep were strewn about ! Picture 

 to yourselves the ruined occupant of the soil, hardly able to 

 escape with his bare life from the sudden scenes of these 

 tragic disasters ! Fortunately, as yet such extreme events 

 may not have happened commonly; yet they did occur, and 

 pronounced their lessons impressively. Let it be well con- 

 sidered, that it is not alone the injudicious overstocking of 

 many a pasture, or the want of water storage, but frequently 

 the very want of rain itself for years in extensive woodless 

 districts, which renders occupation of many of our inland 

 tracts so precarious. Let it also not be forgotten, how, without 

 a due proportion of woodland, no country can be great and 

 prosperous ! Remember how whole mountain districts of 

 Southern Europe became, with the fall of the forests, utterly 

 depopulated; how the gushes of wide currents washed away 

 all arable soil, while the bordering flat land became buried in 

 debris ; how its rivers became filled with sediment, while the 

 population of the lowland were at the same time involved in 

 poverty and ruin ! Let us recollect that in many places the 

 remaining alpine inhabitant had to toil with his very fuel for 

 many miles up to the once wooded hills, where barrenness and 

 bleakness would perhaps no longer allow a tree to vegetate ! 

 It should be borne in mind that the productiveness of cereal 

 fields is often increased at the rate of fully 50 per cent, 

 merely by establishing plantations of shelter-trees; that the 

 progress of drift-sand is checked by tree plantations; and that 

 a belt of timber not only affords protection against storms, but 

 also converts sandy wastes finally into arable meadows, thus 

 adding almost unobserved, yet unceasingly, so far to the 

 resources of a country. 



Shall we follow then the example of those improvident 

 populations, who, by clearing of forests, diminished most 

 unduly the annual fall of rain, or prevented its retention ; who 

 caused a dearth of timber and fuel, by which not solely the 

 operations of their artisans became already hindered or even 

 paralysed, but through which even many a flourishing country 

 tract was already converted almost into a desert. Should we 

 not rather commence to convert any desert tract into a smiling 

 country, by thinking early and unselfishly of the requirements 

 of those who are to follow us? Why not rather imitate the 

 example set by an Egyptian sovereign, who alone caused, 

 during the earlier part of this century, 20,000,000 of trees to 

 be planted in formerly rainless parts of his dominions. 



Dr. H. Rogers, of Mauritius, issued this year a report " on 



