214 AMERICAN FORESTRY 



There are also other publications touching more or less upon this subject, 

 but the above is intended only as a brief review of some of the best works. 



As stated in the li-'uinnino:, there is a vast amount of literature covering 

 the anatomy of woods, and also their mechanical and technical properties and 

 uses, but only such works as touch upon the relation of the two fields of knowl- 

 edge have been cited in this review. 



THE FOREST AND THE FARM 



nIBERTY H. BATLEY, the dean of the New York State College of 

 Agriculture, delivered an address at the University Club in Buffalo, 

 on the country life movement in America, which, if we may judge from 

 the newspaper reports, was full of the wisdom we always expect from him. 

 Mr. Bailey admitted that present conditions in the country were bad, but he 

 declared that these conditions would soon be of the past. Before many years 

 co-operative farming, new methods, new social customs, new relations with 

 the city, would have worked out a complete change in the business of farming 

 and the lot of the individual dwellers on the land. 



But the point of especial interest to us was his plan for utilization of 

 abandoned farm lands, those that have passed out of profitable use forever 

 on account of changed conditions. "Yet," he declared, "they are not useless. 

 It simply does not ]>ay to handle them and they should be put to their destined 

 use." He noted the development of wheat and corn growing on a large 

 scale in the west, leaving truck farming to the east, and that is profitable 

 only near large cities or good transportation. Then he said, as reported, "I 

 am strongly in favor of a system of some sort of county ownership or state 

 ownership. Let the community buy these abandoned lands as it could very 

 cheaply. Let it reforest them. Most of the hill-tops in the Adirondack region 

 and the center of the state could most profitably be converted to that use. 

 Others could be used for raising live stock, others again to raising apples for 

 export. Individual ownership should not be allowed to drop in applying 

 these methods. It could go on and afford good livings to many farmers. But 

 the state should no longer allow those lands to go to waste for want of a 

 little enterprise and co-operation." 



There was much more, but in this suggestion of community ownership 

 and reforestation we believe lies the solution of much of the abandoned and 

 waste liind problem of our densely populated eastern states. Even in such a 

 loiulous state as Massachusetts more than half the land can only be profitably 

 used to grow trees. In part they may be orchard trees, for wonderful fruit 

 can be raised on some of these discouraging looking New England hillsides. 

 But on the larger yai( of this acreage forest trees must be the solution. The 

 future welfare of these siales demands that this i)lan be adopted and soon. 

 Already many of our eastern farmers are learning that their woodlots are not 

 by any means the least of their possessions. Perhaps by and by our towns, 

 counties and states will learn to follow the example of the thrifty communities 

 <f Europe and turn their waste lauds into bank accounts for the people. 



