BTONE ON A FARM. 215 



of stone on our Eastern farms. We may not have 

 present use for them all ; but our grandsons will be 

 wiser than we, and have uses for them which we 

 hardly suspect. I reinsist that land which is very 

 stony was mainly created with an eye to timber- 

 growing, and that millions of acres of such ought 

 forthwith to be planted with Hickory, White Oak, 

 Locust, Chestnut, White Pine, and other valuable 

 forest-trees. Every acre of thoroughly dry land, 

 lying near a railroad, in the Eastern or Middle 

 States, may be made to pay a good interest on from 

 $50 up to $100, provided there be soil enough above 

 its rocks to afford a decent foothold for trees ; and 

 how little will answer this purpose none can imagine 

 who have not seen the experiment tried. Sow thickly, 

 that you may begin to cut out poles six to ten feet 

 long within three or four years, and keep cutting out 

 (but never cutting off) thenceforward, until time 

 shall be no more, and your rocky crests, steep hill-sides 

 and ravines, will take rank with the most productive 

 portions of your farm. 



In the edges of these woods, you may deposit the 

 surplus stones of the adjacent cultivated fields, in full 

 assurance that moth and rust will not corrupt nor 

 thieves break through and steal, but that you and 

 your sons and grandsons will find them there when- 

 ever they shall be needed, as well as those you found 

 there when you came into possession of the farm. 



I am further confident that we shall build more 

 and more with rough, unshapen stone, as we grow 



