American Forest Congress 351 



The main reason why the miner is no longer a foe 

 to forest protection, is on account of two influences at 

 work upon him. First, the missionary work of the 

 foresters has converted him from wantonness in cut- 

 ting timber. The mines are growing larger and less 

 of them, there are fewer mining superintendents to 

 educate and they are men of high grade. But most 

 significant is a changing condition in mining practice 

 by which the mining company falls into the same cate- 

 gory as the lumberman as regards forestry. The 

 change is this, the mining company cuts a continually 

 lessening percentage of its own timber and buys corre- 

 spondingly more from a distance. This increased 

 attention to their own specialty of mining and buying 

 their supplies of all kinds, especially their timber, from 

 outside agencies is as marked a development as any 

 othar kind of industrial specialization and is as greatly 

 aided by increased facilities for transporting supplies 

 from considerable distances. 



The timber merchant will in the future stand between 

 the forester and the mining company. This is fortu- 

 nate, especially in one way. There is no more difficult 

 task than trying to educate the average mining man into 

 any attribute of patience such as planting trees for his 

 successor to use. Hiis whole training is in the line of 

 getting out all his ore with the greatest possible speed — 

 to work out the deposit and go somewhere else. 



Frankly, the mining company often has been and 

 occasionally still may be, worse than the man who 

 skins a country, the miner disembowels it and leaves 

 an absolute desert above and below. If the miner can 

 be taught by forestry methods something of conserva- 

 tism in rushing his mineral to market, the whole 

 country will be better oif. 



Further, it seems that as the friends of good govern- 



