PREFACE 



* 



Forestry is a vast subject. It has to do with 

 farm and forest, soil and climate, man and beast. 

 It affects hill and valley, mountain and plain. It 

 influences the life of cities, states, and nations. 

 It deals not only with the manifold problems of 

 growing timber and forest by-products, such as 

 forage, naval stores, tanbark, and maple sugar, but 

 it is intimately related to the navigability of rivers 

 and harbors, the flow of streams, the erosion of hill- 

 sides, the destruction of fertile farm lands, the 

 devastation wrought by floods, the game and birds 

 of the forest, the public health, and national pros- 

 perity. 



The practice of forestry has, therefore, become 

 an important part in the household economy of 

 civilized nations. Every nation has learned, 

 through the misuse of its forest resources, that for- 

 est destruction is followed by timber famines, 

 floods, and erosion. Mills and factories depending 

 upon a regular stream flow must close down, or use 



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