368 Transacttoxs of the Amertcan Institute. 



corrects tl\e acid of the sap, and prevetits the growth of fungus. 

 Whitewasli is to be recommended as a valuable preservative of wood 

 for a similar reason. 



5. Fence posts should be well seasoned and treated by boiling the 

 end to i,»e set in the ground in tar or rosin. For a foot each way from 



■ the surfoce of the earth, when set, fence posts should be well coated 

 witli a paint that will exclude water. Setting posts top end down 

 does increase their durability. 



6. Painting green wood is worse than useless. It promotes decay 

 by shutting out the air wliich would stiffen the albumen beneath the 

 surface* 



7. This subject is of interest to every man who has a door-yard 

 fence to build, and whose land is not worth more than seventy-five 

 dollars an acre for agricultural pui'poses. 



8. The efforts of inventors should be directed to methods of treating 

 cheap and inferior timber, such as spruce, hemlock and chestnut, so 

 it will be equal to tlie most valuable, as white pine, black walnut and 

 yellow locust. Making all our walls with wood should also be dis- 

 couraged. Stone, brick, or concrete are better and but little more 

 costly. It is time to arrest the lavish and wasteful use of the best 

 building timber. It would be well to consider whether stone or iron, 

 with a cap of some springy material, as India rubber, may not be sub- 

 stituted for wood as sleepers on railroads. Iron and stone ought to 

 replace wood for bridges, and especially railroad bridges ; and last, 

 the material -interests of the present and the coming generations would 

 be greatly advanced if one third of the cleared surface east of the 

 mountains were given back to the dominion of useful forest trees, of 

 M'hicli all our steej) and rocky lands should never have been wholly 

 cleared. 



Dr. J. V. C. Smith. — I have been ver}^ much entertained and 

 instructed by this paper on a subject of the utmost importance to the 

 whole country, and I think this paper ought to appear in the proceed- 

 ings of the Institute. Wherefore, I propose that Mr. Lyman be 

 requested to furnisli a copy of his paper for that purpose. 



Tlie motion was seconded by Mr. P. T. Quinn, and carried. 



Mr. Horace Greeley. — I have followed the essayist M'ith attention ; 

 and to what he has said, all of whicli is excellent, I would add two 

 suggestions : 



1. Farmers must keep their cattle out of forests, if they would have 

 valuable timber. I hav^e some twenty-five acres on whicli I di not 

 get ten rock maples till I fenced it, now I liave at least 500. 



