WEST OF THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER. 965 



prevent fires, and every mountain man unless he is a cattle owner will tell you 

 th;it they do no damage to the forests. Indeed the forests are encroaching on the 

 ranges more and more, instead of being destroyed by the vandal sheepmen. All the 

 old settlers of Sonora, Tuolumne County, say that when they came to the country 

 there were no trees about the town of Sonora. Now the pines grow away down this 

 Bide of that town. In Humboldt County where sheep have run for thirty years in a 

 timbered country, the trees are growing in places where there was not a sign of a 

 tret when the white men first went in there, although sheep have been running over 

 the ground during the entire period. 



My personal observations along the foothills of the Sierra Nevada 

 and in the mountains of Oregon accord with the foregoing. In the 

 Willamette Valley, in western Oregon, there is more timber to-day 

 which has grown up during the forty-five years since fires ceased to 

 run in the grass, as it did formerly when dried up and sometimes into 

 tin 1 timber lands, than there was when the white man and his grazing 

 stock first arrived there. And this notwithstanding the lands have 

 bem constantly grazed by horses, cattle, and sheep, and very large 

 sums have been expended in chopping off, burning, and grubbing up 

 the brushwood and young forest growth to preserve the pasturage or 

 clear land for wheat-growing. 



The foregoing extracts are from a letter of one whose location is near 

 the center of the great plain of California. The following is from one 

 located farther north on the east side of the Sacramento Valley. The 

 same averments as to the case of sheepmen in regard to setting fires, 

 and its effect against their interest when set, are made by correspond- 

 ents from all the different points along the base of the Sierra Nevadas. 

 Mr. Mariner's letter contains some other points of value. The same is 

 true of Mr. Baechtel's, which describes conditions in the coast counties 

 of southwestern Oregon as well as northwestern California, where the 

 firebrand sometimes is used, followed by grass seeds, as forerunners of 

 sheep and cattle. 



Mr. Mariner's letter is dated Sheridan, Cal., February 28, 1892, and 

 is as follows : 



Yours of the 9th instant received, and should from its importance to the sheep in- 

 dustry have been answered sooner but for lack of time. In reply to your first ques- 

 tion as to the income and outlay on my dock for the year, they are about as follows : 



One herder, per year $300 



Shearing, sacking wool, and board of shearers (that is shearing twice) 320 



One extra man in mountains, wages and board four months 190 



Kent of range -. 150 



Extra men on road to and from mountain range 50 



Expenses for incidentals 20 



Total 1,030 



Receipts from sale of wool and mutton 4, 648 



Making the net receipts over expenses about $2.25 per head. This does not in- 

 clude interest on lands of my own, as that has increased in value more than enough 

 to pay a good interest on the original investment. 



Your second question, as to excluding grazing stock from the mountains, is one of 

 great importance to the live-stock industry of the Pacific coast. Whenever sheep 



