EYE TO THE SKY, FOOT TO EARTH 



A Foreword 



WHETHER it is a garden, a farm, or a forest, any piece of land yielding 

 crops may also yield repose and joy. So it is with the millions of acres of 

 our national forests. The pleasures these forests may give the people is the 

 theme of this book. 



For the first white settlers of America the woods lay just beyond the 

 fields or out the door. So it was with woods and other natural wild country 

 all the way to the Pacific. Solitude in a land of marvelous beauty, with 

 clean and shining rivers and an abundance of wildlife, was our natural 

 pioneer heritage as we moved west. 



Wherever modern men go civilization follows and crowds them. Often 

 men are driven into unnatural pursuits and actions not good for the land. 

 This account that 30 foresters have written takes you all over our country 

 and shows you the natural wealth and beauty which still is ours. But it also 

 shows many places where men in ignorance, haste, and covetousness have 

 wronged and hurt their country. We see now that there is a new conquest 

 to be undertaken, a new kind of pioneering to be done, a healing recon- 

 struction from the ground up. It would be no true Forest Service pub- 

 lication if it did not sound this call. The men of this Service have been 

 preaching and practicing conservation for more than a third of a century. 



I sometimes think we need more than ever, now, to refresh our spirits 

 and renew our aims in the solitude of beautiful natural places. There is a 

 natural completeness about outdoor occupations which we who have been 

 forced indoors and penned in cities lack and miss. A man in a desk chair 

 with his feet on a rug and his eye on a wall or ceiling all day long is a man 



VII 



