1906 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



461 



of recommendations to be laid before 

 their Legislatures at the next session. 



It is to be hoped that definite prog- 

 ress may be made in each of these 

 States, for it will not only facilitate 

 the work of the Government, but will 

 also open the way for the more secure 

 investment of private capital in the 

 development of irrigation works in all 

 these States. 



Legislation which will enable the 

 claimants to the use of water to make 

 their rights as definite and certain as 

 the right to the ownership of land, can- 

 not fail to encourage the investment of 



private capital, which has been more or 

 less timid in the past of the difficulty 

 in determining accurately the extent 

 and nature of the rights to the use of 

 water upon which enterprises for irri- 

 gation, water power development, etc., 

 must necessarily depend. 



The commissions engaged upon this 

 work are composed of men standing 

 high in the community as irrigators, 

 business men, and lawyers and they 

 can do no greater service to the State 

 than to aid in securing improvement 

 in irrigation and water right legisla- 

 tion. 



RECREATION AND THE FOREST 



IWI EN work that they may enjoy 

 *** leisure, and make money in or- 

 der to spend it. This is not, perhaps, 

 the normal and proper state of affairs, 

 and it may be that work for its own 

 sake should bring rewarding enjoy- 

 ment. But as the world goes, work 

 may mean overwork, or work with- 

 out real choice or aptitude, so that 

 what might otherwise be a pleasure 

 is too often a dry task. Recreation, 

 therefore, though it takes up but a 

 short span in the course of a lifetime, 

 is cherished in proportion to its brev- 

 ity. If the world had no natural re- 

 creation grounds the ordinary man 

 would lack incentive to labor except 

 to supply the bare needs of existence. 

 For the play instinct, the delight in 

 free activity for its own sake, espe- 

 cially in the great outdoors, is as old 

 as the race and one of its best inheri- 

 tances from its prehistoric ancestry. 



The forest is the most ancient and 

 momentous of human dwelling 

 places. Ever since men, in caves and 

 trees, learned, even among dangers, 

 to regard the forest as a home, the 

 shadows, the silence, the excitements, 

 and the fascination of the forest have 

 stirred the strongest feelings of the 

 race. Dread of the forest, its incentive 

 to achievements, the sense that within 

 it all things good and evil were to be 



found and treasured or encountered 

 and overcome, have left an indelible 

 impress in the minds and hearts of 

 men. 



In primitive days, when the business 

 and risks of life were over for the 

 day, the stern and impressive realities 

 could be rehearsed by the hunter and 

 his children in the mimic world of 

 play. Nowadays, the ordeals of our 

 forest ancestors have become all play. 

 Hunting, picnicking, canoeing, fish- 

 ing, tramping, the tent life and the 

 roaring camp fire, are all survivals 

 of the life of the Forest Age, remi- 

 niscences coursing in the very blood 

 of our civilization and carrying us 

 back to the times when danger was a 

 part of the day's work and success- 

 ful craft against bird and beast and 

 fish was the first condition of exist- 

 ence. Recreation in the forest is the 

 pleasant recall, in imagination, of a 

 life vivid, fresh, free, and heroic. 

 This life, now lost to us in the hum- 

 drum barter of the market place, may 

 be brought back by the power of 

 money, to amuse and invigorate and 

 thrill us yet in our short hours of leis- 

 ure and liberty. 



How highly this reversion to the 

 old life is treasured may appropriately 

 be measured, in these times, by the 

 sacrifices men make, the money they 



