THE AMERICAN FORESTS 868 



The United States government has always 

 been proud of the welcome it has extended to 

 good men of every nation, seeking freedom and 

 homes and bread. Let them be welcomed still 

 as nature welcomes them, to the woods as well as 

 to the prairies and plains. No place is too good 

 for good men, and still there is room. They are 

 invited to heaven, and may well be allowed in 

 America. Every place is made better by them. 

 Let them be as free to pick gold and gems from 

 the hills, to cut and hew, dig and plant, for homes 

 and bread, as the birds are to pick berries from 

 the wild bushes, and moss and leaves for nests. 

 The ground will be glad to feed them, and the 

 pines will come down from the mountains for 

 their homes as willingly as the cedars came from 

 Lebanon for Solomon's temple. Nor will the 

 woods be the worse for this use, or their benign 

 influences be diminished any more than the sun is 

 diminished by shining. Mere destroyers, how- 

 ever, tree-killers, wool and mutton men, spread- 

 in a- death and confusion in the fairest groves 

 and gardens ever planted, — let the government 

 hasten to cast them out and make an end of them. 

 For it must be told again and again, and be burn- 

 ingly borne in mind, that just now, while pro- 

 tective measures are being deliberated languidly, 

 destruction and use are speeding on faster and 

 farther every day. The axe and saw are in- 

 sanely busy, chips are flying thick as snowflakes, 



