182 GREEN TRAILS AND UPLAND PASTURES 



the plains. They remained pioneer communities for a 

 century, while all around them the conditions of life 

 were changing, railroads were built, modern centralized 

 industrialism was born, large-scale farming and stock 

 raising superseded the old-time local husbandry, and 

 what markets the hill people had found for their sur- 

 plus produce disappeared. With the final exhaustion 

 of their timber (due, of course, to ignorant and short- 

 sighted methods of lumbering), they ceased to be desir- 

 able dwelling places for the intelligent and energetic, 

 and became the abode, too often, only of the dull and 

 unenergetic remnant of the old breed, who clung, from 

 inertia, and feebly fought decay. 



Is it of any use to talk of "redemption"? What 

 redemption is possible? The old, happy, independent, 

 stimulating agricultural life of these hill towns can 

 never be restored, at any rate, because such isolation 

 as still must remain their portion, thanks to their 

 physical sites, cannot be endured by the energetic man 

 or woman in the midst of the modern world. The 

 pioneer perishes when his flank is turned by a rail- 

 road and a motor highway. Agriculturally, too, these 

 hills are now of little actual value. To be sure, as 

 sheep and even cattle ranges they have great potential 

 possibilities, but we shall have to educate our entire 

 nation before those possibilities can be realized, mean- 

 while meekly bowing our necks and opening our purses 

 to the meat barons. Regarding our forests, however, 



