1905 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



451 



state financially, and sparsely settled, 

 and the White Mountains as a reser- 

 voir affect all New England, except 

 Rhode Island. Manifestly this is a 

 national proposition. 



Furthermore as a breathing place 

 for thousands, as a conservator of the 

 people's health, as a playground, the 

 White Mountains belong to no one 

 state, but to many. Not in the length 

 and breadth of the United States is 

 there a region whose summer visitors 

 come from so many parts of the coun- 

 try, from so many states. Love of 



purpose which nature has marked out 

 for them. 



The restoration of forests in the 

 path of clean cutting is necessarily 

 slow, but on these granite hills it is 

 often impossible. Ages ago the glacial 

 movement overlaid these upheaved 

 rocks with a thin soil in which the 

 forest growth established itself and 

 which it strengthened from year to 

 year; but the cutting of the upper 

 slopes exposes this soil and it is car- 

 ried off in great slides, leaving bare 

 rock on which nothing save another 



Logs and Lumbered Land, North Woodstock, New Hampshire. 



these hills went westward to New 

 York and far beyond with the emigra- 

 tion from New England, and every 

 year a great tide comes back from 

 other states to enjoy them and to find 

 among them the strength and pleas- 

 ure that they have to give. Here among 

 the older states these breathing places 

 become fewer with each generation, 

 but certain spots are protected by na- 

 ture from over-civilization. These we 

 need to save with care and to preserve 

 everything about them that makes for 

 the efficient accomplishment of the 



.glacial period can ever replace grow- 

 ing soil. The lumber companies are 

 working farther up the high slopes 

 and when the last protecting belt of 

 timber goes, swift destruction follows 

 it. To save for conservative forestry 

 as much as possible of the old forest 

 and to reforest the cut-over areas is 

 the work to be done, and the national 

 government and the national torest 

 service are the agencies that must be 

 look; (1 ro for these results. 



I / t the national reserve pi ''icy he 

 i:\-ide truly nntional. The system is 



