51 



the most valuable wood and timber. Planted on dry, sandy oi 

 gravelly pastures, they greatly fertilize the soil by their abun- 

 dance of tender leaves, which, falling on the ground, rot in the 

 course of the winter and spring. Cattle arc particularly fond 

 of the grass which grows thick and luxuriantly under them, as 

 well as of the young trees which are continually springing up 

 from their roots. 



Similar advantages may be derived from planting low, rocky 

 or boggy lands, which are generally covered with alders and 

 other useless bushes, with common willows. These trees not 

 ©nly produce wood, which when dried is better than white pine, 

 faster than most other trees, but greatly meliorate boggy soils, 

 and bring in a better kind of grass, which makes excellent pas- 

 turage. Of the correctness of these assertions, every one, who 

 will take the trouble to examine the land under groves of locust 

 and willow trees, must, I think, be fully convinced. They are 

 most certainly not the vain speculations of a theorist. Like ma- 

 ny other facts contained in this address, they are derived not 

 from books, but from the observation, and experience of my 

 worthy father, who spent an industrious, useful and observing* 

 life in the practice of husbandry. Nor are the above mentioned 

 the only advantages derived from covering pasture lands with 

 trees. They serve to shelter the cattle, while feeding, from 

 the exhausting effects of a burning sun. They prevent rapid 

 evaporation, £^nd probably attract showers ; consequently in- 

 crease the size of adjacent streams, and thereby fertilize soils 

 far beyond the reach of their shadows. Besides, whatever 

 grows out of the earth ultimately returns to it again, to afford 

 food for other plants which succeed. Consequently the more 

 any soil can be made to produce, the more that, or some oiher 

 in the neighbourhood, will be enriched. Do any doubt the cor- 

 rectness of these theories? Why has Palestine, or the holy 

 land, which once flowed with milk and honey, and supported by 

 its own produce, on an extent of territory not exceeding that of 

 Massachusetts, seven millions of people, become so barren as 

 scarcely to be able to preserve a few thousand miserable 

 wretches ? Why has the river Jordan, once undoubtedly a no- 

 ble s tream rolling through fertile valleys, been reduced to a small 



