FOREST POLICY. 45 



10. Floods are not of greater frequency and longer duration 

 than formerly." 



With regard to the effects of forests on rainfall, the following 

 may be quoted from recent writings of Professor Cleveland Abbe, 

 the senior professor of the Weather Bureau, and a member of 

 the National Academy of Science. He says: 



"It is a pity that the errors of past centuries should still 

 continue to be disseminated long after scientific research has 

 overthrown them. In this day and generation the idea that 

 forests either increase or diminish the quantity of rain that 

 falls from the clouds is not worthy to be entertained by rational 

 intelligent men. 



It is doubtless safe to say that there is no scientific proof 

 that the growth of forests increases the rainfall of a locality 

 or that their cutting away appreciably diminishes it." 

 The experts of the National Weather Bureau conclude: 



"It is apparent that the precipitation that causes floods in 

 the eastern half of the United States is derived from the 

 aqueous vapor raised up from the vast waters to the south and 

 southeast of our continent, and that the supply is inexhaustible. 

 Our rainfall, then, is the result of such fundamentally great 

 causes as not to be appreciably affected by planting or cutting 

 away of forests, or by any of the operations of man in changing 

 the character of the surface covering of the continent." 



