February 20, 1889.] 



Garden and Forest. 



93 



and dust and noise and wearing care of life at home and in 

 the towns. The preservation of these mountain woods for 

 this use was of vital importance to the people of the nation in 

 general, and the inhabitants of New Hampshire possessed in 

 them a source of perpetual revenues. As population, wealth, 

 leisure and the disposition to seek change of scene in sum- 

 mer increase in our country, these mountains and valleys 

 have been thronged by an ever-changing multitude of guests, 

 glad to have the opportunity of paying liberally for the com- 

 forts and luxuries of life while sojourning at the great moun- 

 tain hotels. The region was worth more to the state than the 

 richest gold mines would have made it. The one condition 

 of a permanent and most liberal income was the protection 

 and preservation of the forests. They are, in very great pro- 

 portion, already ruined. They have been cut and burned 

 away in most unintelligent disregard of their value. In con- 

 sequence, the charm of the region is in great measure de- 

 stroyed. The value of the hotel property will be seriously im- 

 paired, and many of the places which were once the loveliest 

 are now desolate and hideous. The hills themselves are 

 crumbling and dissolving, and a blight and curse are settling 

 upon important parts of this sanctuary of beauty and peace. 

 It might have been preserved uninjured forever ; and yet it 

 might have yielded another great revenue from the timber 

 which it produces, most of which could have been cut, at 

 proper times, without impairing the value of the forests in 

 any way. All this would have been practicable, if we had 

 been sufficiently civilized. 



I have not time to speak of the loss by the destruction of 

 this great source of timber supply, nor .of the injury to the 

 streams which have their sources here, the disastrous floods 

 and the depleted summer how, or the effect on the industries 

 and subsistence of thousands of men and women in the great 

 mill-towns between these mountains and the sea. The in- 

 jury to New Hampshire agriculture is to be recognized, 

 though it is less important, because most of the state is un- 

 suited to cultivation, and should have been left permanently 

 under forest conditions. Some portions of the hill-country of 

 western Massachusetts, have, in a considerable degree, the 

 same character as the mountain region of New Hampshire, 

 and should be taken care of accordingly. 



Men who own small tracts of woodland, especially suc- 

 cessful lumbermen of towns and cities who have re- 

 cently acquired them, are apt to thin and prune and drain 

 and clear away the undergrowth, and, in short, to change as 

 completely as possible all the conditions under which the 

 trees had lived hitherto, and then wonder that the trees do 

 not thrive. One thing necessary to most trees in this part of the 

 country is shade. In New Hampshire, as in many other 

 regions, the southern side of ravines and the north side of 

 hills grow up to trees whenever they are protected from cattle 

 and fire. But where the ground slopes to the south it re- 

 mains bare. The trees will not grow, the young plants being 

 scorched to death by the sun, and this is true of some of the 

 level country where the land has been exhausted by tillage. 

 Of course the forest would skirmish around and would cover 

 such places in time, conquering them slowly from the edges, 

 but such object-lessons are instructive, if we have eyes to see 

 them. The chief things required for the successful manage- 

 ment of such tracts of woodland is to protect them from fire 

 and from pasturage, and then let them alone, mostly. The 

 trees will do best under the conditions which produced them 

 and have always nourished them hitherto. 



The destruction of the timber of a forest by fire is a trivial 

 loss compared with the permanent injury to the soil itself, 

 which always results from forest fires. The burned land pro- 

 duces only inferior trees, and repeated burnings destroy the 

 soil itself. We already have deserts of our own in this 

 country created by this process, where the soil was before 

 remarkably fertile. But, taking our whole country together, 

 pasturage is a worse enemy to the forests than even fire, be- 

 cause it is everywhere. It operates more slowly, but it brings 

 a ruin just as certain and complete, and where forest land is 

 pastured there can be no permanent forest. If it is necessary 

 or desirable to grow timber or trees in Massachusetts and New 

 England, it is indispensible that some lands should be set 

 apart for tree culture, and protected entirely from pasturage. 

 The pasturage of woodlands is a feature of existing agricul- 

 tural methods, in which achange might well begin, which should 

 be extended to the whole matter of pasturage, and its relation 

 to the ferfility of the soil and to the profit and loss of farming. 

 There can be no considerable advance or improvement, 

 except by giving up some existing practices and methods, and 

 adopting better ones in their stead. A little synthetic obser- 

 vafion would convince thoughtful men that pasturage has too 



large a place in our present methods of agriculture, and that it 

 is a wasteful and costly process, especially in its effect on the 

 fertility of the soil. I think it would be an important step in a 

 real advance in civilization if in Massachusetts and New Eng- 

 land the pasturage of domestic animals were to a great extent 

 gradually, and not too gradually, relinquished. This belief is 

 sustained by more reasons than can be presented to-day. To 

 feed cattle in-doors would enable farmers to save and utilize 

 all the manure. In pastures it is largely wasted, and is often 

 even an injury to the grass upon which it is dropped. 



Forestry and arboriculture are chiefiy economical subjects. 

 Where tillage is more profitable than the production of timber 

 or trees, the land should be cultivated. Where wood-products 

 are the most profitable crop, there forest conditions should, of 

 course, be maintained. But considerable intelligence, instruc- 

 tion, observation and forethought may be required to deter- 

 mine what lands are really available for profitable agriculture. 

 A great deal of land is tilled and pastui-ed in Massachusetts 

 and New England which should never have been cleared or 

 cultivated. When farms are abandoned it means that they 

 should never have been farms. The land would have been 

 more valuable under permanent forest conditions. 



Our agricultural methods are steadily impairing the fertility 

 and productiveness of a large proportion of the soil of our 

 country. It is tilled and pastured to the last degree of ex- 

 haustion, and about everything that people can think of is done 

 to hasten the process of impoverishment. A little while ago I 

 saw the great wheat country of the Red River of the North all 

 ablaze with the burning straw over hundreds of square miles. 



We are not worth so much as we think we are. Much of 

 our agriculture impairs and exhausts the capital invested in 

 land. Methods that exhaust the soil of a country cannot 

 rightly be regarded as civilized methods. The wants of our 

 people are increasing. More and more is required to make 

 life comfortable, interesting and satisfactory to the inhabitants 

 of this country, while we deal most ignorantly and carelessly 

 with the soil, which is the great store-house from which nearly 

 all our wealth and means of subsistence must come. 



I think that in Massachusetts and New England forestry and 

 arboriculture should be considered largely in their relations to 

 ao-riculture and to the permanent fertility and productiveness 

 of the soil. It is important to observe that, while no method 

 or system can reasonably be recommended which would be 

 permanently unprolitable, yet much experiment is often neces- 

 sary here in tree-planting and culture, as in other fields, and 

 we cannot expect that each particular step or effort will in 

 itself be profitable, or will yield a satisfactory return for the 

 capital invested. No considerable advance is easily or quickly 

 made, and changes are necessarily attended with some 

 inconvenience. 



There is no way of learning all about these subjects at once. 

 People who read and study good papers and books on forestry 

 are likely to know more about forestry and arboriculture than 

 anybody else. 



But the great need is, not that the people of Massachusetts 

 and New England should accept any particular opinions or 

 judgments regarding these subjects, but that they should 

 examine these subjects with a new degree of attention and 

 interest, especially in their economic aspects and relations. 

 We do not need a sentimental fashion of talk about trees and 

 tree-culture, but we do need, as a means to a most important 

 end, to have the people of Massachusetts and New England 

 think about trees, talk about them, read about them, write 

 about them, until there is a tree-feeling in the air, and such a 

 reverberation of sensible and practical teaching on the sub- 

 ject as will compel general attention. 



Correspondence. 



Shrubs for Shad}^ Places. 

 To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir. — Please give a list of shrubs which will lloin-ish under 

 the shade of deciduous trees. 



Boston, Jaiiuai'v, 1889. a^. A. 



[The number of shrubs which can be grown under the 

 shade of trees depends largely upon the density of the 

 shade. If the trees under which it is desired to carpet the 

 ground are growing close together, or if they are trees 

 which produce a dense shade, it will be found difficult to 

 establish a satisfactory growth of other plants under them. 

 The Periwinkle is the best plant to use under such circum- 

 stances. It is an evergreen, very hardy, and, when once 

 established, it will flourish in deep shade. The difficulty in 



