3 22 



THE FORESTER. 



December, 



trol the floods of the Mississippi would 

 be largely saved because foresting the va- 

 cant lands, storing the winter floods, and 

 soaking the dry plains with surplus water 

 would go a long way toward preventing 

 the yearly peril. The present system is 

 going from bad to worse for already the 

 bottom of the river is higher than miles of 

 farms and thousands of houses, and every 

 dollar spent in piling up levees makes it 

 higher and increases the danger. 



Settlements develop mining as well as 

 other industries, thus still further stimu- 

 lating the demand for machinery, tools, 

 powder, etc., which reaches all over the 

 East. Every farm will be within reach 

 of the hills that everywhere contain pros- 



supplies of all kinds, to say nothing of the 

 population it always attracts, in the way 

 of traders, professional men, and non- 

 combatants of every kind. The miner is 

 always a good liver and has no use for 

 money except to spend it, and a mining 

 community consumes more of the good 

 things of life, per capita, than any other 

 class of men. They send out the cash for 

 everything they eat, drink, or wear, and 

 it all has to be carried to them. They 

 afford an excellent outlet for all the farm 

 produce that can be raised and thus build 

 up towns and villages in the valleys, mak- 

 ing opportunities for professional and busi- 

 ness men, which in turn draw upon the 

 great trading centers of the older states. 



ARID LAND THAT CAN BE RECLAIMED. 



pects, and the young men will go there 

 instead of fiddling their time away. They 

 can work in a nice warm tunnel all 

 through the storms of winter, piling up 

 ore that can be hauled to mill when the 

 roads open, and are likely at any stroke of 

 the pick to discover a valuable mine, and 

 a good mine is the greatest market maker 

 in the world. The work itself requires 

 immense outlays for labor, machinery, and 



The arid states are already valuable, 

 customers for their neighbors east of them, 

 and when it is considered that a popula- 

 tion fifty or a hundred times as great would 

 not crowd them at all, their value as future 

 allies can be imagined. 



The interchange of commerce has been 

 the greatest incentive to ambition in all 

 ages that the world has known, and to- 

 dav it is the dominating force, stronger 



