TREES AND TREES. 107 
such a charmed existence. Our eyes seek the old sugar 
bush on the hillside, the maple groves in the pasture 
fields, the wild cherry trees in the meadow, and the 
wide spreading elms that stood sentinels at the gate- 
ways. Fortunate, indeed, if these “landmarks and love- 
marks” are still standing, but oftener we find them 
sweptaway. Some Erisicthon in the guise of the “model 
farmer” could not tolerate mere objects of beauty where 
they stood against the bank account. There were dol- 
lars’ worth of cord-wood in the maples; the cherry tree 
shaded valuable grass land; children, when they came 
in the later summer time to gather cherries, trampled 
down the aftermath ; and the elms obscured the view of 
the new house. And what are landscapes and senti- 
ments and affections in comparison with gratified pride 
and accumulated dollars? If sentiment and love of 
scenery have no influence in restraining our people from 
this prodigal waste of forests, at least a regard for the 
physical condition and welfare of the country should 
cause them to pause and ask themselves what will be the 
final and near consequence of this almost total extinc- 
tion of our forests. Great freshets and inundations, 
bare hills still farther disfigured by unsightly gullies, 
extended droughts and dried-up vegetation, a loss of 
equilibrium of climate, seasons of extreme heat quickly 
followed by intense cold, violent and destructive storms, 
a scarcity of insect-destroying birds, and thereby a 
great increase of pestiferous insects that annoy man and 
prey upon the products of his industry, a drying up of 
