262 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



May 



man, have marched across the American 

 continent hand in hand and built up the 

 mightiest nation on the earth in one of 

 the greatest wildernesses ; and they have 

 much work ahead of them. Let them 

 alone. 



What, then, shall we do with the For- 

 estry Bureau? If these "scientists' 1 

 will not keep out of mischief and let the 

 West alone, abolish it. Look at their 

 ignorant interference. They are telling 

 us that the little sheep pack the ground 

 so that the rain will not sink into our 

 gravelly soil, while the big cows and 

 horses do no harm. They are telling 

 the sawmill men to cut this tree and 

 not cut that one, while we have to make 

 the kind of lumber the settlers need and 

 choose the trees that will make it. We 

 know our business. They are telling us 

 to burn the offal, when a lighted cigar 

 will easily start a fire in our tinder-box 

 forests. And the Interior Department 

 tries to compel the frequenters of the 

 reserves to do these things or go to 

 prison. 



"Why, they are burning the brush 

 in all the reserves. " They are not. A 

 government official comes to inspect a 

 tie camp. A feast is prepared for him 

 turkey, oysters, and champagne and 

 on the day of his arrival my informant 

 is ordered to take some men and pile 

 some brush. After dinner the inspector 

 is shown the men at work, and then he 

 goes back and reports that the law is 

 being complied with. What fools these 

 mortals be ! 



: But there can be no harm in the 

 Forestry Bureau investigating scientific 

 problems connected with forestry." 

 When they arrive at erroneous conclu- 

 sions, there is always harm, to say noth- 

 ing of the money wasted. Have they 

 the ability to conduct original investi- 

 gations ? Here is how they investigated 

 the effect of timber upon the snow : 

 Money was sent to one of our college 

 professors. He got a friend to go up 

 into the mountains and take a half 

 dozen kodak views of the snow, who 

 found where it had drifted under clumps 

 of trees, and the photos were engraved 

 and a bulletin published, in which the 

 professor dogmatically stated that tim- 

 ber is a great preserver of snow. He 

 did not even see the snow, but upon 



this report 750,000 acres of land were 

 withdrawn from settlement in order to 

 furnish water for a proposed govern- 

 ment reservoir. 



But the greatest objection to forest 

 reserves is that they stop development 

 forever. The homestead law does not 

 apply to reserved lands, nor do the other 

 laws enabling the people to acquire 

 ownership of the public land. Ex- 

 cluding Alaska, about 526,000,000 acres 

 are open for settlement. The reserved 

 lands sum up 151,000,000, of which 

 60,000,000 acres are in forest reserves 

 that can never be settled upon, not even 

 inhabited or even frequented by people 

 who respect law, for the reserve laws 

 are made by government officials with- 

 out even consulting the people affected 

 by them. They are impossible to keep, 

 and are not fit for savages, and the 

 people have no redress except in defeat- 

 ing a President, and in the territories 

 they have not even that. What gov- 

 ernment ! The worst of tyrants are 

 the petty tyrants, and behold we see 

 the forestry associations assembled in 

 convention at Colorado Springs last Oc- 

 tober calling for federal troops ' to 

 patrol the reserves. ' ' 



Shall this nation go on growing, or 

 shall we go on making forest reserves 

 and forever stop its growth ? Shall the ' 

 people have their natural rights re- 

 stored to them and preserved, or shall 

 the government cater to the spirit that 

 depopulated Europe and built up Amer- 

 ica ? Shall our pioneers be our natural 

 heroes, or the forestry faddists and 

 "scientists," the nation's pets? Read 

 "Forest Law," in the Encyclopedia 

 Britannica, and compare those laws 

 with the reserve laws shown in the 

 Land Office circulars, and you will 

 agree with me that forest reserves and 

 human liberty cannot stand upon the 

 same ground. One or the other must 

 go down. 



H. J. M. MATTES. 



Fort Collins, Colo. 



All this reminds us of an old Tennessee 

 moonshiner, who, commenting on the activity 

 of the revenue officers, said: "Since these 

 doggone gover'ment fellers begin acomin' 

 round, a man caint earn an honest livin' any 

 more." 





