113 



enumerated among the staple articlcsof export which "fetch 

 money from other parts." Then there were huge fireplaces 

 and wide-moiitl:ed ovens, to siip|)ly which made sad inroads 

 on large wood-piles. Every farm had its wood-lot, and 

 stent o.K-teams were kept busy in the winter, when the 

 sledding was good, hauling wood and timber to the nearest 

 town for sale, or keeping up the home supply of fuel. 



When the General Court of Massachusetts in 1819, en- 

 acted a lavv granting bounties to the Agricultural Societies 

 within the Commonwealth, it was made the duty of each 

 one of them to " offer annually such premiums for the 

 raising and preserving of oaks, and other forest trees, as to 

 them shall seem proper, and best adapted to perpetuate, 

 within the state, an adequate supply of ship-timber." 



The Essex County Agricultural Society, with the other 

 associations entitled to receive the liberal bounties thus of- 

 fered by the State, have drawn their respective amounts 

 with commendable regularity from the treasury, and they 

 have as regularly oflered premiums for plantations of trees 

 suitable for ship timber, but, (with the exception of the 

 groves at Lynnmere and on Indian Hill), not enough has 

 been raised for the construction of a pilot-boat. 



It is not the fault of the Society that every bald-pate hill 

 in the county has not been reclothed with wood, to adorn 

 the landscape, and so husband the rain that our dried-up 

 brooks would again be filled with living water. The Trus- 

 tees have oflered liberal premiums, which committees have 

 generously awarded whenever they could conscientiously do 

 so, and the annual Orators have frequently urged the plant- 

 ing of forest trees. All admit the necessity for tree-plant- 

 ing, but only a very few have planted trees. Since coal 

 has been burned in the fire-boxes of locomotives and in 

 domestic cooking stoves, the area of woodland in the coun- 

 ty has increased, but no system is adopted for thinning out 

 the natural growth, which Professor Sargent well says, is 



