ARBOR DAY ITS HISTORY AND OBSERVANCE. 33 



to be a citizen without providing something for him or her to do for the public good. 

 Every citizen should in some way aid in making every acre of the State as produc- 

 tive as it can be made. Of all things, a useless soul and a useless acre are the most 

 useless. I call upon you young people here, who are thinking already what you will 

 do when you grow up, to resolve that you will be patriots, and help make the laud 

 in which you live as near a paradise as you can. You will be wiser if you begin at 

 once to do some good thing. Here is a chance. Every tree that is planted helps to 

 save water for the uses of the people. It helps to restrain the floods which destroy 

 life and property. It helps to keep the air in pure condition for you and your asso- 

 ciates. It helps to moderate the climate so that crops may grow and fruits mature. 



If, then, you plant a tree, you increase the wealth and strength of the Common- 

 wealth, and at the same time you aid in husbanding its resources. Is not this a 

 worthy work? But it is so small a thing, you may say! . True, but life is made up 

 of small things. How many really great things can anyone do? The great acts of 

 any man's life are few. It is the multitude of small deeds which makes life important. 



Nebraska was once almost a treeless area. Now it is a well-wooded State. This is 

 almost entirely due to the Arbor Day... plan ting which Secretary Morton started a 

 score of years ago. His example has spread from State to State, until over almost the 

 entire Union a day is set apart every year for the purpose of tree planting. European 

 countries are taking up with the idea. It has spread to the isles of the ocean. If 

 we except Christmas and Easter, there is probably no anniversary more widely cele- 

 brated than Arbor Day. Of course the date must vary with the country. In our 

 Southern States, February 22, the birthday of Washington, is often selected as 

 Arbor Day. 



I desire especially to call attention here to a mistake too often made in connection 

 with Arbor Day: This is the planting of foreign instead of native trees. It is now 

 well known that no foreign species except possibly the Eastern plane tree is so long- 

 lived as the corresponding native species. As between foreign and native trees, then, 

 give the first place to our own species. In the country, as in smaller towns, nothing 

 is better than our white oak, a native elm, or a sugar maple. Do not plant the sil- 

 ver maple. It is too weak to support its own enormous growth. It must be cut 

 back. This opens the way for decay, and just when your tree should be in its prime 

 it is in the stage of decay. 



Reforms mature slowly. See with what infinite persecution the emancipation 

 problem was worked out! Before our land became in deed and in truth "the land 

 of the free," every hamlet received its baptism of blood and every citizen felt the 

 drain upon his finances. 



The great temperance reform has grown from contempt into respectability, and 

 before you young people are in the prime of life you will see under restraint the 

 monster of intemperance, which brings untold agony into thousands of homes. So 

 it is with the forestry problem. We are now passing from the period of destruction 

 to the period of restoration. Hardly a State in the Union but is concerning itself 

 with this great reform. Pennsylvania has earned a first place as a pioneer in the 

 movement. In my travels over the country I see on all sides the signs that a refor- 

 mation is at hand. When I was a lad I never saw or heard of planting a tree in a 

 school yard. Now, in the remotest parts of the State, I see growing in school yards 

 the trees under whose ample branches the children of the next generation will play. 



I look on the hopeful side of things. The world has constantly been, in the main, 

 becoming better fitted for the prosperity and comfort of men. It is the natural 

 order of evolution. It is not too late to restore our forests on land where nothing 

 but trees will grow. It is not too late to make our roadsides, our school yards, our 

 swamp land, and our barren ridges eloquent witnesses of God's willingness to help 

 us beautify our living places, and perpetuate the prosperity of our Commonwealth. 

 You may never command armies, or thrill a listening nation by your eloquence; but 

 you may at least, each one of you, leave a thrifty, growing tree, or more than one, 



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