long- run, whether or not we are to preserve or destroy the forests of 

 the Rocky Mountains according!}^ as we are or are not able to make 

 the people of the mountain States hearty believers in the policy of 

 forest preservation. 



That is the only wa}' in which this policy can be made a permanent 

 success. You must convince the people of the truth — and it is the 

 truth — that the success of home makers depends in the long run upon 

 the Avisdom with which the nation takes care of its forests. That 

 seems a strong statement, but it is none too strong. 



You yourselves have got to keep this practical object before 3^our 

 mind; to remember that a forest which contributes nothing to the 

 wealth, progress, or safety of the country is of no interest to the Gov- 

 ernment and should be of little interest to the forester. Your atten- 

 tion, must be directed to the preservation of the forests, not as an end 

 in itcelf, but as a means of preserving and increasing; .he prosperity 

 of the nation. 



"Forestrv is the preservation of forests b}' wise use," to quote a 

 phrase I used in my iirst message to Congress. Keep before your 

 minds that definition. Forestry does not mean abbreviating' that use; 

 it means making the forest useful not onlj' to the settler, the rancher, 

 the miner, the man who lives in the neighborhood, but, indirectly, to 

 the man who ma}^ live hundreds of miles off down the course of some 

 great river which has had its rise among the forest-bearing mountains. 



The forest problem is in man}^ ways the most vital internal problem 

 in the United States. The more closely this statement is examined 

 the more evident its truth becoDaes. In the arid region of the West 

 agriculture depends first of all upon the available water supph\ In 

 such a region forest protection alone can maintain the stream flow 

 necessary for irrigation, and can prevent the great and destructive 

 floods so ruinous to communities farther down the same streams that 

 head in the arid regions. 



The relation between the forests and the whole mineral industr}^ is 

 an extremely intimate one; for, as ever}^ man who has had experience 

 in the West knows, mines can not be developed without timber — 

 usually not without timber close at hand. In many regions through- 

 out the arid country' ore is more abundant than wood, and this means 

 that if the ore is of low grade, the transportation of timber from any 

 distance being out of the question, the use of the. mine is limited by 

 the amount of timber available. 



The ver}^ existence of lumbering, of course — and lumbering is the 

 fourth great industrj^ of the United States — depends upon the success 

 of our work as a nation in putting practical forestry into effective 

 operation. 



As it is with mining and lumbering, so it is in only a less degree 

 with transportation, manufactures, commerce in general. The relation 



