74 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



elsewhere, why may they not do so here also? As to the 

 supply of timber, if the United States exhaust her own 

 resources, if the forests upon which such inroads have 

 been made should, as they certainly will, become depleted, 

 in what direction shall we turn? We have been lavish and 

 extravagant, and have unfortunately helped to reduce 

 Canada to almost our own condition, and cannot, therefore, 

 look to our Hyperborean neighbor. The question will soon 

 demand an answer. 



In considering how far trees add to the beauty of a 

 country, we must have regard not only to their place in 

 expansive landscape, but to the beautifying of our 

 homes and cities. There are places for them in all public 

 squares, and in most, if not ail streets. In the country 

 and around country houses they should be reared on all 

 sides, near the homestead and in the fields. Health and 

 comfort alike demand their presence. Should it be said 

 that "trees take a long time to grow, why should I plant 

 them for others to sit under?" a sentiment is given ex- 

 pression to which is not only selfish, but stupid. There 

 is, in the first place, a pleasure in the culture of trees 

 which would alone amply repay any trouble bestowed upon 

 them. In the next place, they are at almost any age bene- 

 ficial to the soil and climate, and in a few years wid afford 

 both shade and shelter from the wind. Lastly, a few years 

 more will bring them to such a condition that their timber 

 can be applied to many uses and so be made a. source of 

 profit. It is said by one writer, speaking in general terms, 

 that "groves and belts of woodland will in twenty years 

 from planting— perhaps in less time — afford shade, protec- 

 tion, fenciDg, fuel and material for many other purposes." 

 They protect, beautify and profit. The value of a country- 

 seat or farm upon which thriving trees are being reared is 

 vastly enhanced by their presence, and to an extent al- 

 together out of proportion to their value as mere timber. 

 Thus, a house and its grounds may, from location and ex- 

 tent, be worth $10,000, although, the entire absence of 

 trees gives the place an unattractive appearance. The 

 same grounds, properly shaded and planted with trees 

 worth $1,000, would in all likelihood sell at $15,000, so 

 that $4,000 would represent the value not their own other- 

 wise than as it represents the value of the beauty im- 

 parted by the trees to the property. This is a point worthy 

 of the consideration of those who have constitutional ob- 

 jections to benefit posterity. 



In making a choice of the kinds to set their speciai 

 purpose must be considered. For lawn and grounds the 

 leading qualifications will in all probability be rapidity of 

 growth and density of foliage. The tree combining both 

 these requisites to the greatest extent will be regarded as the 

 best. For other purposes the quality of the timber will be 

 the prime consideration. Upon these various points only 

 a few hints can here be given. The following results of 

 an experiment made a few yeai\3 ago in Illinois afford some 

 valuable information regarding the rate of growth of the 

 forest trees ennumerated. Ail the plants when set out 

 were between six and twelve inches high. At the end of 

 twelve years the height of each was taken. European 

 larch had reached a height of 30 feet; while pine 35 feet; 

 American larch 25 feet; silve*- maple 25 feet; Norway 

 spruce and Scotch pine each 20 feet; white ash, chestnut, 

 white elm, Scotch elm, Austrian pine and balsam fir each 

 16 feet; black walnut and European birch 14 feet; sugar 

 maple 12 feet, and European beech 10 feet. In taking the 

 above as a guide allowance must be made for the fact that 

 all were grown in the same soil which would necessarily 

 be better adapted for some than for others. The first 

 mentioned, the European larch, although not reared to any 

 great extent in this country, has many qualities to recom- 

 mend it to the planters. Its appearance is exceedingly 

 beautiful, its growth rapid, and its timber valuable. One 

 great characteristic of the latter is its durability, in whicli 

 respect it far exceeds the oak. It is, therefore, well 

 adapted for shipbuilding, for any purpose in answering 

 which timber is exposed to the continual action of water, 

 such as piles, or of the weather, such as fences or props. 

 At present, however, the favorite tree of America for or- 

 nament and shade is the maple. Of it there are nine 

 species, which go under the following names: silver, red, 

 sugar, black sugar, striped, mountain, Norway, sycamore, 

 and ash-leaved, or box elder. Although of slower growth 

 than the silver the sugar maple is the most valuable of the 

 different species, and to compensate for its tardiness it 

 ultimately attains a greater altitude than its principal rival. 

 It possesses great beauty of appearance, its timber ranks 

 next to -hickory for fuel, and is largely devoted to many 

 well-known purposes in cabinet-making. The production 

 of sugar from its sap is an additional and peculiar ad- 

 vantage. Notwithstanding the possession by the sugar 

 maple of these good qualities many prefer the silver va- 

 riety. The beautiful silvery foliage, the greater rapidity 

 of its growth and graceful appearance have made it a 

 prime favorite among arboriculturists when ornament and 

 shade are desired. Its timber is excellent for fuel, but, 

 although sometimes used for furniture and flooring, it is 

 not very valuable. It grows best in a dry soil. Under 

 ordinary circumstances it will grow from twelve to twenty 

 four inches the first year, and where the conditions are 

 very favorable the rate will be doubled. The black-sugar 

 maple resembles that first noticed too closely to demand 

 separate notice. Of the other species several, although 

 their timber is sometimes used for exceptional purposes, 

 such as gunstocks, are only raised for the sake of orna- 

 ment. Ail the varieties are propagated from seeds. In 

 many places in the country young trees can be had for 

 almost nothing. It this eity young silver-leaved maple§ 



can be had, from ten to twelve feet high, at one dollar 

 each. Assuming that, according to the rate's previously 

 given, the latter rise two feet per annum, it will be seen 

 that in a very few years a maple grove giving abundance 

 of shade may be had at comparatively little expense. 

 The value of black walnut, taken in connection with its 

 rapid disappearance, affords one of the most striking com- 

 mentaries upon the folly of cutting down trees in the 

 prevalent wholesale fashion. It has now almost entirely 

 disappeared from the western forest, where it was once 

 most abundant. It grows very rapidly, is easily obtained, 

 its timber is valuable and in constant demand, and it is, 

 therefore, one of the trees best deserving the care of the 

 planter. There are many varieties of poplar, the greater 

 number of which grow very quickly, and are for that rea- 

 son planted for the ornamentation of grounds. The white 

 variety is more valuable than any of those of native pro- 

 duction. As an ornamental tree on lawns it has the ob- 

 jection of throwing up suckers from its roots, but it is one 

 of the best adapted for the btreets of a city. The oak is 

 slow of growth, but, when arrived at maturity, its majes- 

 tic beauty is by many thought to be unsurpassed by any 

 other tree. The elm also is slow, but it is, when of sufficient 

 size, a very desirable shade tree. The whiie species is 

 particularly attractive in appearance, and liko the poplar 

 is exceptionally well adapted for city life. As screens for 

 sheltering horses, and for the purpose of relieving land- 

 scapes of the dreary monotony of the wintry leafiessness 

 of deciduous trees evergreens are in every way preferable. 

 In respect of rapidity of growth, density of foliage and 

 beauty the horn of spruce is the best for shelter. 



It is, however, impossible to exhaust this snbject. What 

 has been said may inspire a few to take an active interest 

 in arboriculture, and help in guiding their first efforts. 

 Governmental measures ought, no doubt, to be taken to 

 insure both the planting of new forests and the preserva- 

 tion of what remains of the old. But every individual 

 who perceives the necessity we are endeavoring to urge, 

 and who has even the most limited opportunity cau help 

 in the attainment of the objects had in view by the Na- 

 tional Forest Convention. 



OUR CENTENNIAL LETTERS—NO. 10. 



THE. Mineral Annex to the Main Building is a strange 

 place to look for animals, but here Mt. Union 

 College, Alliance, Ohio, has deposited a late contribution 

 of half a dozen extremely interesting quadrupeds. The 

 most prominent among them is a great ^gorilla, standing 

 upright, and baring a chest which measures 54 inches 

 around. This is the fellow which Du Chaillu had so hard 

 a battle with in the forests of the Gaboon River, Western 

 Africa, and killed, only after the gorilla had used up at 

 least one rifle by bending the barrel as if it were made 

 of licorice. Du Chaillu sent this one to Paris, whence it 

 came to America, an/l a second one to the London Zoologi- 

 cal Gardens. It is a male, is in perfect order, is well 

 mounted, and is of great value. Oberlin College has a 

 skin and skeleton (mounted) of a female, also from the 

 Gaboon, and these two are all that I now remember in 

 American museums. This college claims to have a cabinet 

 of natural history and geology worth $500,000, but it is 

 mostly packed up. A new building, however, is soon to 

 be devoted to science at the College, when the collection 

 will be properly arranged. The other animals they exhibit 

 here are worthy of almost equal attention. One is the 

 flying lemur, of the Phillipines, which is a sort of link 

 connecting the bats and monkeys; between its limbs, and 

 extending in a triangle to th« tip of the tail, is a parachute, 

 or fold of skin, covered with hair, as in our flying-squirrel 

 In size the lemur about equals a gray squirrel, and the 

 color is a soft pearly gray, but the young one clinging to 

 its mother's bosom is reddish-brown. From Australia 

 hails a bright and nimble looking little creature, which is 

 a curious compound; it has the plantigrade hind feet of a 

 bear, the short fore-<*rms of a kangaroo, witJi "hands" 

 suited to grasping the branches of trees, along the under 

 side of which it often travels like a sloth; its head is 

 shaped much like that of a bear, but with large incisor 

 teeth like a rodent; the ears are large and adorned with 

 heavy tuits of hair; finally it is pouched, and is, therefore, 

 a marsupial, as is everything else in Australia except the 

 wild uog. Its native name is koala, and its scientific, Phas 

 cotarctos cinereus or the ash-colored pouched- bear — a very 

 expressive title. It represents the transit from the cuscus 

 and other phalangine animals to the kangaroos, filling a 

 gap among the macropode families. Its food is of a vege- 

 table nature, chiefly gathered at night in the flowering 

 trees. W hen the young koala is able to leave the pouch, the 

 mother places it upon her back, where it clings for some 

 time. Another Australian animal is the pretty little 

 brown and gray kangaro ,-rat. It is said to be very lively 

 in its movements, but not to use its long hind legs for 

 leaping as do its larger brethren, but to gallop along much 

 like our deer mouse. 



Representing bouth America is a magnificent specimen 

 of the ant-eater, known in Brazil, its home, as tamandria 

 bandeira, from the structure of the tail, which it holds 

 over its back like an awning, or spreads over itself like a 

 robe. It is tour or five feet long, brownish gray, marked 

 with black on the back, throat and shoulders, and is cov- 

 ered witn coarse, long hair, which on the tail forms a heavy 

 plume, under which its owner is content to rest instead of 

 constructing a burrow. This is an improvement on "your 

 own vine and fig tree," tor these will not bear a constant 

 transplanting, the ant eater has no teeth in its elongated, 

 tapering head, but a very long tongue coated with a viscous 

 fluid, with which it laps up the ants, upon which it lives, 

 as one would sweep them up with a mucilage brush. 



Another very notable collection of animals, and, except 

 the Smithsonian's, the best array of our mammals on the 

 Grounds, comes from Colorado, and is the work of a wo- 

 man—Mrs. M. A, Maxwell 8 of Boulder, Col, Naturally it 



is in the Kansas and Colorado Building, occupying half *f 

 one. wing. It might be asked, why space in the Women'« 

 Pavilion was not chosen? I do not know, but it is possibly 

 that the talented artist preferred to put her work in com 

 petition with that of the men who are wresting wealth and" 

 comfort from the stubborn rocks and soils of the new West 

 rather than with the embroideries, painting, bed quilts aud 

 scrap-books of feminine exhibitors. But, althwu-h her 

 work is masculine, I should be sorry to imply that hi 

 author is, except in the noble way of ability to take care of 

 herself if need be. It was my good fortune to secure an 

 introduction, and thus have pointed out to me many inter 

 esting features which a cursory glance might have over" 

 looked. 



Mrs. Maxwell having a corner, she has filled it with a 

 rude pile of dry goods boxes, over which has been thrown 

 canvas painted and sanded, so as to make a very good pile 

 of weather-beaten rocks, broad aud high enough to leave 

 space for a large closet underneath, which Mrs. Maxwell 

 calls her "den," and whither she escapes from the innumer- 

 able bores whose tiresome curiosity can only thus be 

 evaded. Upon this rocky bluff, over which a toirent leaps 

 and falls into a basin below, the animals are arranged in 

 natural attitudes; and one might believe a deluge had 

 drawn them in a crowd to this last resort, and terror had 

 made them friends. The top of the ledge is crowned wiih 

 a forest of evergreens, among which the dusky forms of 

 several grizzly, cinnamon, and black bears are discovered 

 standing upright or moving about; on a projecting pin- 

 nacle stands erect a mountain i-heep— a leader of the flock 

 —ready in an instant to do battle with those great horns of 

 his for his charge hidden behind the rocks; on another 

 pinnacle is a goat, almost as white as the snow-banks along 

 the edges of which he seeks the newest blades of grass 

 Then there are the deer of the mountains— the mule and 

 white-tailed, and strangely, a red deer, which is extremely 

 rare so far west. Upon one of the deer, which with wiue- 

 open mouth, panting nostrils and flying feet, haps a chasm 

 in a wild race for lite, a cougar is just in the act of spring- 

 ing, and we cannot resist the impression that a real tragedy 

 has thus suddenly been arrested. In the little coiner 

 of gravelly plain left on the floor an elk, holds high 

 his splendid antlers, and a prong-horn anielope stands alert 

 almost on tip-toe, ready for instant flight. There is also a 

 huge buffalo, most excellently mounted. Besides these are 

 grouped about wolves, coyotes, wild-cats, badgers, beavera, 

 (with the stump of a cottonwood three feet through, 

 which they have chiseled off);, several foxes, porcupines,' 

 the rare black-footed ferret; a common skunk with its 

 young, and the little striped skunk; a family of minks, 

 and a full series of the rodents, including some peculiar 

 rats and mice and a shrew, which remain to be certaiuly 

 identified. There are also a pair of live prairie dogs, which 

 are as lively as possible, aud of great strength, tuggiug at 

 the large wires of their cage until they have pulled several 

 out of place or broken them in two. They are very tame, 

 will come at the call of their mistress, and answer her 

 petting by fine, sharp little barks. They were very inter- 

 esting. There are a pair of live rattlesnakes under a giasa 

 cover also, that Mrs. Maxwell has much to say about, 

 which I have not space to repeat. 



The whole display is a remarkable one, only the main 

 features of which I have indicated. It is a typical repre- 

 sentation of the fauna of the Rocky Mouniains, and is 

 nearly full. The gathering and taxidermy and arrange- 

 ment of the whole, is the unaided work of this lady, who, 

 herself, shot the majority of the smaller animals. Mrs. 

 Maxwell, when a little girl, lived with her father on the 

 frontier of civilization, in southern Wisconsin, aud her 

 father was an ardent sportsman. With abundant oppor- 

 tunity for exciting practice, Mrs. Maxwell became an ex- 

 cellent shot and close observer, delighting more in the 

 beauties and novelties of nature than in the nonsense 

 wh-tou occupies the attention of most young ladies. This 

 was not carried to an extieme, now ever, and studies, dis- 

 ciplinary and refining, were thoroughly mastered, com- 

 pleted by graduation at Oberlin College. When, having 

 married, she moved to Boulder, Colorado, the desire to 

 explore the zoology of the new region was carried out in 

 tne making of this, and a much larger series at home, and 

 a vast collection of birds, nests and eggs, shells, etc., 

 which I am reserving tor a fuiure notice. Mrs Maxwell 

 is under the meuium height, about 35 years old, and, in 

 a face somewhat tanned by exposure, mains a youthful 

 beauty, supplemented by a keen, eager eye, and a counten- 

 ance lull ot animation and intelligence. 



1 repeat, that the series of animal? shown here is remark- 

 able, and that it is a remarkablu woman who has brought 

 H^together. 



«*^ - 



The "Pacific Life."— W e have received the first num- 

 ber of the Pacific Life, a journal issued in San Francisco, 

 to be devoted to field sports, game protection, and particu- 

 larly to National Guard matters. To the Editor, Col. H. 

 G. Shaw, President of the National Rifle Association, our 

 own columns have been indebted for much interesting 

 rifle matter from the Pacific slope. The newspaper in its 

 first issue presents a large variety of interesting matter, 

 and while it could doubtless be improved upon, it has be- 

 fore it a field ripe for such an enterprise. 

 ■ ■< » » ' 



— Wm. Milliken of St. Cloud, Minn., informs the Sod 

 and Gun that he can sell wild rice at the end of next 

 month at $2.50 per bushel. It can also be bought of 

 Richard Valentine, Janesville, Wis., or T. P. Cant we 1, 

 Brainerd, Minn. 



^*» 



"Modern Josephs."— On Monday evening, Sept. 4th, 

 the Rev. Henry Morgan of Boston, delivered the above 

 lecture in Steinway Hall for the benefit of the Ladies' Aid 

 Society of the M. E. Church of Hunter's Point. It is a hit 

 at political parties and the grabbing at spoils, and is full of 

 rollicking fun, as well as keen satire. 

 — — ■♦•» 



— The Providence and Stonington Steamship Company's 

 new steamer Massachusetts (3,000 tons) was launched from 

 the ship-yard of Mr. Henry W. Steers, Greenpoint, L. I., 

 on Wednesday the 6th inst. She is a noble vessel and will 

 be a mo*! valuable acquisition to the vessels of this popular 

 line. 



—They hare an active PoloGiubiu HmFmmte§®> 



