February 6, 1S95.] 



Garden and Forest. 



51 



GARDEN AND FOREST, 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



TH^ GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office : Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER AT THE POST-OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1895. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Editorial Article : — The Forests on the National Domain 51 



Kructiticatiun of the Cork Oalt C. E. Faxon. 52 



The White Elm in the West Professor Charles A. Kyjfer. 



Foreign Correspondence: — London Letter w, IVatson. 



New or Little-known Plants :— Gunnera manicata. (With figure ) IV. IV. 



Plant Notes 



Cultural Department; — Treatment of Amaryllis A". O. Orpet. 



Sweet Potatoes from Slip Seed .' Professor M. H. Beckwith. 



Chinese Primroses E. O. Orpet. 



Meetings of Societies: — Nebraska State Horticultural Society.— II 



Western New York Horticultural Society. — II 



Notes 60 



Illustrations : — Gunnera manicata, in Cornwall. England. Fig. S 55 



The Forests on the National Domain. 



WHAT is to be the fate of forests on the national 

 domain, antj how is the much larger forest area 

 of the country, now in private hands, to be managed in 

 the future, are questions which, a few years ago, would 

 have e.xcited but trifling interest anywhere in the United 

 States. The current issue of The Century magazine shows 

 that these matters are now subjects of serious study by 

 many thoughtful Americans. The editor of a great period- 

 ical is a good judge of what subjects are of immediate 

 popular interest, and the fact that The Century not only 

 makes a distinct proposition of its own for action in the 

 matter of forest-preservation, but devotes ten pages to 

 setting forth the views of persons who, from their official 

 standing or personal knowledge, are qualified to say some- 

 thing worth hearing on the subject, is an evidence that we 

 are gradually nearing the time when indifference and leth- 

 argy in relation to this matter will give place to an active 

 realization of the fact that the prosperity of our country 

 is directly connected with the proper management of our 

 forests. 



Six years ago, when speaking of the nation's forests, it 

 was urged in this journal that all forest-lands belonging 

 to the Government should be withheld from sale until an 

 examination of these lands, and of the agricultural lands 

 depending upon them for water-supply, would show what 

 tracts of timber could be put upon the market without 

 threatening important interests in the country below them. 

 For the protection of these forests against injury from man 

 and beast, it was advised that, pending this investigation, 

 the guardianship of the forests on the national domain 

 should be entrusted to the United States Army, and that 

 this examination of the national forests should be con- 

 ducted by a commission, appointed by the President, of 

 men able to report upon the magnitude and quality of our 

 forests, and upon their relations to other interests. 

 No commission was appointed, however ; perhaps the time 

 was not ripe for such a plan, modest and moderate as it 

 was ; but certainly if such a commission had then been 

 named, we should now know more about our forests than 

 we do. In The Century symposium a man so well quali- 

 fied to speak as Mr. Bowers, the Assistant Commissioner 



of Public Lands, declares that estimates of the amount of 

 forest-land owned by the Government vary between the 

 lowest and the highest by twenty millions of acres, which 

 means that we have no absolute knowledge whatever. 

 And since no one can do more than make a rough guess 

 at the area of these lands, any surmise as to the amount 

 of timber growing on any portion of them, or of its value, 

 or of the ease or difficulty with which these woodlands 

 can be made permanently productive, would be wilder 

 still. It seems, then, that the need of a board of investigation 

 is quite as urgent to-day as it was when the proposition 

 was first made, and The Century now advocates the crea- 

 tion of a commission, composed of men whose reputation 

 will give their recommendations weight, and whose duties 

 shall be to study the whole question of forest-preservation, 

 and report fully upon it to Congress. 



Such action need not interfere with any other legisla- 

 tion, for the first thing to be done under any scheme would 

 be to get more knowledge, and no better way of obtaining 

 information about our forests can be devised than that of 

 sending competent men to the ground to examine them. 

 The Century also revives the other recommendation that 

 until this report is made all forest-lands should be withheld 

 from sale. And why not.? No private interest can suffer 

 by such a delay. No one has an inalienable right to 

 demand that the Government shall sell him a wood-lot. It 

 is true that there are delicate questions involved in the 

 necessities of pioneers, who need wood for fuel or timber 

 for mines. This is one of the very points which such a 

 commission should be called upon to study, and certainly 

 it would not be unwise for the Government to hold fast to 

 all its lands until they could be disposed of more intelli- 

 gently. 



There seems to be little question as to the advisability of 

 employing the army as a police force while this investi- 

 gation goes on. Captain Anderson, who has been in com- 

 mand of the troops in the Yellowstone National Park, 

 ought to be a competent judge in this matter, and in his 

 contribution to the symposium it is stated that the soldiers 

 of his command have served every purpose of a forest- 

 guard most satisfactorily. There have been suggestions 

 about lectures on forestry in West Point, with an experi- 

 mental forest-reservation on the Highlands, but upon these 

 points there are differences of opinion. It is admitted that 

 there would be an advantage in giving officers of the army 

 a brief course of forest-study, and there are objections to 

 the plan which it is not necessary to state, but there seems 

 to be no question that the army is the one body now prop- 

 erly organized to take charge of our forest-reserva- 

 tions, to protect them from fire and trespassers and to 

 execute any regulations imposed upon them by Con- 

 gress. Such police work does not need any exhaustive 

 knowledge of forestry, and undoubtedly the army as 

 it is can protect the reservations and all the national 

 forests as thoroughly as they have protected Yellowstone 

 Park. Of course, this service would only be temporary, 

 for the time is coming when a policy, which only means 

 mere protection of the woods from timber thieves and 

 browsing animals and fire, must be replaced by an active 

 system of reproductive management such as is used in 

 other industries of this country and in the forests of other 

 civilized nations. 



It is to be hoped that the press of the country will unite 

 with The Century in this recommendation to Congress. No 

 one doubts that something ought to be done, and done 

 now. No one has suggested anything that will cause less 

 disturbance, and which, with so small an outla)% promises 

 so much. No elaborate machinery is called for, no large 

 appropriation. Congress is simply asked to help secure 

 the knowledge which is needed before an intelligent and 

 consistent scheme can be devised for managing this great 

 property which is now wasting so rapidl)' away before our 

 eyes. Of course, we must ultimately have some compre- 

 hensive system of forest-management. No such system 

 can be carried into execution, however, unless it is based 



