28 president's address. 



Forests. — The address of President Roosevelt was, as we have 

 said, delivered at the National Congress of 1905, held to consider 

 the great subject of Forest Reservation and National Prosperity. 

 At this Congress "practical methods of safeguarding the broad 

 business interests of the nation, now threatened by wholesale 

 forest destruction, were considered by lumbermen, railroad men, 

 •engineers, foresters, and representatives of the mining, grazing, 

 oooperage, and other interests, of the several States and of the 

 National Government." The President of the United States 

 himself delivered the opening address. 



Australia, and New South Wales in particular, has been 

 lavishly endowed by nature with forests of the most valuable 

 timbers in the world. These have been handed down to us 

 intact by the simple-minded Aborigines. It has been reserved 

 for the white man to set about skinning the country. Our 

 immensely valuable forests have been recklessly devastated by 

 fire and axe, by men regardless of all but immediate and personal 

 returns, until the very existence of some of the most important 

 timbers is threatened. The timber wasted has been infinitely 

 greater than the timber used. The forests have been destroyed, 

 not reaped. Here, again, the Government is confronted with a 

 tremendous problem — How to maintain and supervise our forests, 

 so that we may have a perennial supply of timber for all our 

 own increasing needs and for export to less favoured countries, 

 and that the forests themselves may remain efficient to perform 

 the important functions which it is their business to perform in the 

 general economy of nature. It is no mere sentiment, the desire 

 to preserve things beautiful, though there is no sin in that, but 

 the absolutely material necessities of every commercial and 

 industrial class, of every individual in the Commonwealth, which 

 compel us to urge upon the Government the scientific supervision 

 and care of our forests. We need living trees and much wood, 

 -and our children's children will need them no less than we. 

 What are we going to do in order to make sure that those needs 

 shall be abundantly satisfied 1 



