314 WHAT I KNOW OF FARMING.^ 



could be milked here and left through night as well 

 as day, it would be found good economy. 



7. I know that most of us are slashing down our 

 trees most iinprovidently, and thus compelling our 

 children to buy timber at thrice the cost at which we 

 might and should have grown it. I know that it is 

 wasteful to let White Birch, Hemlock, Scrub Oak, 

 Pitch Pino, Dogwood, etc., start up and grow on 

 lands which might be cheaply sown with the seeds of 

 Locust, White Oak, Hickory, Sugar Maple, Chestnut, 

 Black Walnut, and White Pine. I know that no 

 farm in a settled region is so large that its owner can 

 really afford to surrender a considerable portion of it 

 to growing indifferent cord-wood when it would as 

 freely grow choice timber if seeded therefor ; and I 

 feel sure that there are few farms so small that a por- 

 tion of each might not be profitably devoted to the 

 growing of valuable trees. I know that the common 

 presumption that land so devoted will yield no re- 

 turn for a life-time is wrong know that, if thickly 

 and properly seeded, it will begin to yield bean-poles, 

 hoop-poles, etc., the fifth or sixth year from planting, 

 and thenceforth will yield more and more abundant- 

 ly forever. I know that good timber, in any well- 

 peopled region, should not be cut off, but cut out 

 thinned judiciously but moderately and trimmed up, 

 so that it shall grow tall and run to trunk instead of 

 branches; and I know that there are all about us 

 millions of acres of rocky crests and acclivities, steep 

 ravines and sterile sands, that ought to be seeded to 



