105 



should say that in common lands, wood of twenty years' growth would yield fifteen or 

 twenty cords of firewood per acre, besides fencing timber sufficient to always keep in 

 repair an inclosure of two hundred acres. Then the ten or twelve trees growing in reserve, 

 will, at the end of eighty or one hundred years, furnis|i timber fit for shipping or staves. 

 Where land has become useless from long cultivation, a little trouble only is necessary to 

 make it productive and profitable to the owner. By enclosing it for a few years and 

 encouraging the growth of the most promising young trees, which will generally spring 

 up spontaneously, all the advantages above described will be derived fronj it, which is 

 certainly the best way that worn out or sterile land can be disposed of. Such a course 

 recommended to and adopted by individuals would not only be to their own private gain, 

 but also of great public utility." 



A New-Hampshiee Expeeience. 



" The Hon. Levi Bartlett, of New Hampshire, has given in the result of his expe- 

 rience, an interesting illustration of the profits that might be realized from tree-planting 

 in this State, covering a period of above fifty years. A tract had been cleared and 

 thoroughly burned over in a very dry season, about the year 1800. It immediately seeded 

 itself with white and Norway pines, and about twenty-tive years after came into his pos- 

 session. He at once thinned out the growth on about two acres, taking over half the 

 number of the smallest trees, the fuel much more than paying the expense of clearing ofi". 

 From that time, nothing was done with the lot for the next twenty-five years — having 

 sold it, however, during that time. Upon examining it, he found that, by a careful esti- 

 mate, the lot which had been thinned was worth at least a third more per acre than the 

 rest which had been left. It was worth at that time at least $100 per acre. He thought 

 that had the land been judiciously thinned yearly enough would have been obtained to 

 have paid the taxes and interest on the purchase, above the cost of cutting and drawing 

 out, besides bringing the whole tract up the value of the two acres which had been 

 thinned out. 



" At the time when this part was thinned (twenty-five years from the seed), he took a 

 few of the tallest, about eight inches on the stump, and forty to fifty feet high, and hewed 

 on one side for rafters for a shed. At the next twenty-five years (fifty from the seed), 

 he and the owner estimated that the trees left on the two acres would average six or eight 

 feet apart. They were mostly Norway pine, ten to twenty inches in diameter, and eighty 

 to a hundred feet high. He was greatly surprised seven or eight years after, to see the 

 increase of growth, especially the two acres thinned thirty years before. The owner had 

 done nothing except occasionally cutting a few dead trees. It was now the opinion of 

 both, that the portion thinned out was worth twice as much as the other ; not, however, 

 that there was twice the amount of wood on the thinned portion, but from the extra size 

 and length of the trees, and their enhanced value for boards, logs and timber. There were 

 hundreds of Norway and white pines that could be hewn or sawed into square timber, 

 from forty to fifty feet in length, suitable for the frames of large houses, barns, and other 

 buildings^ There were some dead trees on the two acres thinned at an early day, bj.it 

 they were only small trees shaded out by the large ones. On the part left to nature's 

 thinning, there was , a vastly greater numbei- of dead trees — many of them fallen and 

 nearly worthless? Of the dead trees standing, cords might be cut, well dried, and excel- 

 lent for fuel. Estimates were made that this woodland would yield 350 cords of wood, or 

 150,000 feet of lumber per acre. Allowing that these were too large, the real amount 

 must have brought a very large profit on the investment." 



The following from Mr. Emerson, of Massachusetts, is valuable especially in its sug- 

 gestions of what might be done to improve our present forests : 



" On nearly every farm in Massachusetts, more land is under cultivation than can be 

 profitably managed. Many acres now in tillage might, with great advantage be turned 

 into forest, and the labour and manure which have been spread upon them, be used in 

 the better cultivation of the remaining acres. All that portion of every farm which is 



