308 CONCLUSION. 



fertile, now treeless and barren and dry, may be attributable in part, 

 if not in whole, to other causes besides the destruction of the forests, 

 and cases in which the extensive destruction of forests does not 

 appear to have extensively aifected the quantity of the rainfall over 

 a wide expanse of country. 



These facts may, by a little latitude in the use of language, be 

 characterised as antagonistic or conflicting ; but they may neverthe- 

 less be accepted as facts, and that with the admission that if facts 

 they must be perfectly compatible with each other, and not only 

 compatible but consistent with each other in the actually existing 

 system of things, and necessary to be known in order to a correct con- 

 ception of this system as a whole. 



s it is with these apparently conflicting facts which I have cited 

 so does it appear to me to be with those apparently conflicting facts, 

 connected with details, which I have refrained from bringing forward 

 here : they do not appear to me to invalidate in any way those which 

 have been founded on in the conclusions I have advanced. 



When I was a boy I was told of one of my townsmen, that, being on 

 trial before one of the magistrates for the theft of a hen, when a 

 witness testified that he had seen him take it, he broke forth with a 

 vehement appeal " Your honour ! I can bring forward twenty men who 

 did not see me." And to such testimony might be likened testimonies 

 to facts which are not in question cited as sufficient to invalidate 

 explicit testimony to other facts observed. I am prepared to admit 

 unhesitatingly all that can reasonally be said in regard to my accept- 

 ance as facts of what I have accepted as such ; the conclusions I 

 have drawn from them I commend to the consideration of my readers ; 

 and I leave to their judgment to determine to what extent these should 

 influence deliberations on the adoption of practical measures to avert 

 the evil and to secure the good which appear to be at our command. 



The effects of forests in retarding the flow of the rainfall after its 

 precipitation has been established, I consider, beyond all question ; 

 and not less so their eff'ect in maintaining a general humidity of 

 atmosphere and of soil. 



