6 THE FOREST FLORA AND CONDITIONS OF 



lars and black cherries of East Tennessee are equaled by 

 few from any other states and surpassed by none. 



But we must speak only of Middle and East Tennessee, 

 and especially of the latter division. The middle divi- 

 sion of Tennessee, including tti"e great blue-grass region, 

 is forestally less interesting than the eastern division. 

 It contains the prize agricultural lands of the state, pro- 

 ducing such quantities of tobacco, cotton, wheat, and 

 sweet potatoes as are nowhere else to be found. I need 

 not describe them; fair samples are to be found among 

 the agricultural exhibits. But originally this region was 

 the home of the largest red cedar and the finest black 

 walnut and poplar. To-day, as one travels through these 

 fertile districts, there is little to remind you of the great 

 wealth of red cedar timber, now practically gone from the 

 rich, tillable lands. In fact, if you did not look sharply, 

 you would not discover that the miles and miles of gray- 

 brown, two-or-three-hundred-year-old looking rail fences 

 are of good old red cedar. It must have been very com- 

 mon and its virtue of outlasting men and things well 

 known. I do not know whether the old Tennesseeans 

 who split those rails were, from their abundance, guilty 

 also of using red cedar for fire-wood or not, but suspect 

 that they were, as even now people dare to burn the 

 stumps for this purpose. It is eminently the greatest 

 cedar region of the South. Red cedar is found in nearly 

 every county of the state, but a circle of counties to the 

 east and south of Nashville including Wilson, Ruther- 

 ford, Marshall, Fentress, Overton, Davidson, Pickett 

 comprises the region of old and new supply from which 

 about all the commercial cedar of the state was and is 

 now derived. 



But, although the red cedar is forever gone from these 

 fertile lands, it still remains on small and large areas, 

 as the case may be, of exposed limestone and otherwise 

 barren knobs, which are scattered throughout the re- 

 gion. These spots, from one-half to fifty or more acres, 

 give one the impressive idea that red cedar grows here 

 because it can not help it. A large amount of this cedar 



