PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 381 



trees would mature. Only a few soft-wooded and little-valued trees, soft maples, 

 box elder, cottonwood, etc., have been planted to any extent, while the more valu- 

 able woods, oak, pine, cypress, walnut, hickory, etc., which require from seventy to 

 six hundred years to reach merchantable condition, have been almost totally neg- 

 lected. 



Americans are migratory. Few old established estates exist. We in America 

 have not yet learned the lessons which the European nations have practiced for 

 centuries that of making the forests a perpetual source of income. 



By proving to the world the valuable character of Catalpa speciosa, and in the 

 distribution of seeds and trees, the International Society of Arboriculture has 

 been instrumental in creating an interest, and secured the planting of many 

 thousands of acres of forest, which could not have been accomplished other- 

 wise. 



