THE AMERICAN FORESTS 851 



thousand feet above the sea. The enormous logs, 

 too heavy to handle, are blasted into manageable 

 dimensions with gunpowder. A large portion of 

 the best timber is thus shattered and destroyed, 

 and, with the huge, knotty tops, is left in ruins 

 for tremendous fires that kill every tree within 

 their range, great and small. Still, the species is 

 not in danger of extinction. It has been planted 

 and is flourishing over a great part of Europe, 

 and magnificent sections of the aboriginal forests 

 have been reserved as national and State parks, 

 — the Mariposa Sequoia Grove, near Yosemite, 

 managed by the State of California, and the 

 General Grant and Sequoia national parks on the 

 Kings, Kaweah, and Tule rivers, efficiently 

 guarded by a small troop of United States cav- 

 alry under the direction of the Secretary of the 

 Interior. But there is not a single specimen of 

 the redwood in any national park. Only by gift 

 or purchase, so far as I know, can the govern- 

 ment get back into its possession a single acre of 

 this wonderful forest. 



The legitimate demands on the forests that 

 have passed into private ownership, as well as 

 those in the hands of the government, are increas- 

 ing every year with the rapid settlement and up- 

 building of the country, but the methods of lum- 

 bering are as yet grossly wasteful. In most mills 

 only the best portions of the best trees are used, 

 while the ruins are left on the ground to feed 



