STORY OF OUR NATIONAL FOREST 89 



north of Connecticut and Rhode Island, most of 

 New York and Pennsylvania, the Great Lakes coun- 

 try and the crest of the Southern Appalachians as 

 far south as Georgia, the conifers prevailed. Four 

 species of pines including the famous white pine 

 which housed the growing nation for many decades, 

 hemlock, balsam fir, and three species of spruce cov- 

 ered together many thousands of square miles. But 

 growing with them in fascinating variety and oc- 

 casional profusion were many deciduous species. 

 Red, sugar, and silver maples, no less than ten spe- 

 cies of oaks, besides beech, ash, hickory, poplar, and 

 birch, were some of many hardwoods which, by their 

 very presence, differentiated the coniferous forests 

 of our East from those of the far West in which de- 

 ciduous trees formed an insignificant part. 



In the South, the enormous yellow pine belt, 

 whose remainder to-day is the last considerable sin- 

 gle source of virgin pine east of the Rockies, bor- 

 dered the Atlantic coast from Chesapeake Bay to 

 Florida, and the Gulf coast westward into Texas. 

 In the alluvial bottoms and swamp lands of these 

 states, six or seven species of oak besides gum, pop- 

 lar, hickory, ash, beech, maple, elm, white cedar, lo- 

 cust, willow, cottonwood, bay, and sycamore were 

 numerous and luxuriant. Fragments of these hard- 

 wood interludes among the southern pines still 

 abound. The southern forest, it will be seen, was 

 marvelously varied and beautiful. 



And between the northern and the southern 



