And State Papers 559 



description of their timber with the United States 

 Geological Survey, and the preparation of plans for 

 their conservative use with the Bureau of Forestry, 

 which is also charged with the general advancement 

 of practical forestry in the United States. These va- 

 rious functions should be united in the Bureau of 

 Forestry, to which they properly belong. The pres- 

 ent diffusion of responsibility is bad from every 

 standpoint. It prevents that effective co-operation 

 between the government and the men who utilize the 

 resources of the reserves, without which the interests 

 of both must suffer. The scientific bureaus gener- 

 ally should be put under the Department of Agri- 

 culture. The President should have by law the 

 power of transferring lands for use as forest re- 

 serves to the Department of Agriculture. He already 

 has such power in the case of lands needed by the 

 Departments of War and the Navy. 



The wise administration of the forest reserves 

 will be not less helpful to the interests which depend 

 on water than to those which depend on wood and 

 grass. The water supply itself depends upon the 

 forest. In the arid region it is water, not land, 

 which measures production. The western half of 

 the United States would sustain a population greater 

 than that of our whole country to-day if the waters 

 that now run to waste were saved and used for irri- 

 gation. The forest and water problems are perhaps 

 the most vital internal questions of the United 

 States. 



Certain of the forest reserves should also be made 



