34 ANNUAL REPORT OF 



Bridgie. The surface of the country is moderately un- 

 dulating. The pine is mixed with spruce, balsam, white 

 and yellow birch, poplar and maple, with intervening 

 swamps of cedar and tamarack. There are occasional 

 pure stands of white and of Norway (or red) pine, but 

 generally the pine is mixed with large leaved trees. The 

 soil is a black sandy loam with a subsoil of yellow clay 

 and gravel, and will all be good for agriculture and sustain 

 a large population. 



As indicating the richness of this forest, some quarter 

 sections (i6o acres) are known to contain 2,000,000 feet 

 board measure of pine, and worth $12,000. Generally the 

 white pine trees are of medium size, but there are some 

 which singly will yield 5,000 feet of lumber. The United 

 States has parted with its title to practically all of this 

 splendid forest, mostly under the homestead law, partly 

 by sale, under the stone and timber act, at I2.50 per 

 acre, and by the location of scrip. (I have elsewhere 

 discussed these ways in which Congress allows the United 

 States pine lands to be disposed of. ) The pine is mostly 

 in the possession of lumber companies and will be cut and 

 removed, if times continue prosperous, within the next 

 eight years. It is safe to say that the value of this pine 

 as it stands is 112,000,000. Some of it will be floated 

 down streams into Red Lake, thence into the Red River 

 valley and the Dakotas; but the most of it will reach a 

 market over the Minnesota & International Railway, the 

 rails of which are laid ten miles beyond Black Duck, and 

 which is heading for the Big Falls of the Big Fork river. 

 Branch logging railroads are being built from this road 

 through the forest. 



Considering the newness of the settlements, it is per- 

 haps surprising that the roads are as good as they are. 

 They can be traveled except in an unusually wet spell, 

 but the stumps and roots left in the roadway make it 

 impossible for a team to go faster than a walk, and there 



