CLIMATE AS INFLUENCED BY THE FOREST. 135 



Commissioners of Forestry for 1877, quoting from 

 a paper by M. A. C. Becquerel, on the " Climatic 

 Effects of Forests," * page 310, says : 



" The forests exercise in many ways an influence upon the 

 climate, but to understand this we must define what we under- 

 stand by climate. 



" The climate of a country, according to M. Humboldt, is 

 the combination of calorific, aqueous, luminous, aerial, electri- 

 cal, and other phenomena, which fix upon a country a definite 

 meteorological character that may be different from that of 

 another country under the same latitude and with the same 

 geological conditions. According as one or another of these 

 phenomena predominate we call the climate warm, cold, or 

 temperate, dry or humid, calm or windy. 



" We always regard heat as exercising the greatest influence, 

 and after this the amount of water falling in different seasons 

 of the year, the humidity or dryness of the air, prevailing 

 winds, number and distribution of storms throughout the year, 

 clearness or cloudiness of the sky, the nature of the soil and 

 vegetation which covers it, and, according as it is natural or 

 the, result of cultivation, the following questions arise for 

 consideration : 



" 1. What is the part that forests play as a shelter against 

 the winds or as a means of retarding the evaporation of rain- 

 water ? 



* Reprinted, by permission, from a " Report upon Forestry," 



1877, by Franklin B. Hough. Washington Printing-Oflice, 



1878. Pp.650. 



