THE AMERICAN FORESTS 335 



they are rich beyond thought, immortal, immea- 

 surable, enough and to spare for every feeding, 

 sheltering beast and bird, insect and son of 

 Adam ; and nobody need have cared had there 

 been no pines in Norway, no cedars and deodars 

 on Lebanon and the Himalayas, no vine-clad 

 selvas in the basin of the Amazon. With such 

 variety, harmony, and triumphant exuberance, 

 even nature, it would seem, might have rested 

 content with the forests of North America, and 

 planted no more. 



So they appeared a few centuries ago when 

 they were rejoicing in wildness. The Indians 

 with stone axes could do them no more harm 

 than could gnawing beavers and browsing 

 moose. Even the fires of the Indians and the 

 fierce shattering lightning seemed to work to- 

 gether only for good in clearing spots here and 

 there for smooth garden prairies, and openings 

 for sunflowers seeking the fight. But when the 

 steel axe of the white man rang out on the 

 startled air their doom was sealed. Every tree 

 heard the bodeful sound, and pillars of smoke 

 gave the sign in the sky. 



I suppose we need not go mourning the buf- 

 faloes. In the nature of things they had to give 

 place to better cattle, though the change might 

 have been made without barbarous wickedness. 

 Likewise many of nature's five hundred kinds 

 of wild trees had to make way for orchards 



