INFLUENCE OF THE FORESTS ON WATER POWER. 17 



they are helpless against the absence of sufficient water in time of 

 drought The only recourse is the use of supplementary steam mills 

 at great expense in construction and maintenance. 



A considerable amount of power from the falls on the several 

 rivers is used in the generation of electricity. In this respect water 

 power in the future is likely to be more important than in the past. 

 With electric power transmission, factories need no longer be in an 

 inconvenient place at the waterfall, where market and transportation 

 facilities are both absent. It permits the development of power 

 high up in the mountains at points formerly regarded as inaccessible. 

 If the coal fields shall ever become exhausted, as it is claimed that 

 they may, water powers will become still more valuable as sources of 

 light, heat, and power. 



Those who use the water powers most constantly realize that the 

 preservation of the mountain forests is important. Hon. T. Jefferson 

 Coolidge, of Boston, president of the Amoskeag Manufacturing Com- 

 pany, says: 



For some years the manufacturing establishments on the Merrimac River in New 

 Hampshire have suffered seriously from the cutting down of the forests. One freshet, 

 a few years ago, cost the Amoskeag Company more than $100,000. Besides the injury 

 done by the excessive flow of water in freshets, we suffer also in the same way from 

 absence of water during dry seasons, as the woods no longer retain the water. It is 

 emptied at once, and not held back to trickle slowly into the streams. But New 

 Hampshire is not the only State. * * * The Connecticut, the Merrimac, and the 

 Saco all have "their sources in the White Mountains, so that Vermont, Connecticut, 

 and Massachusetts are equally interested, and even the Androscoggin derives part 

 of its stream from the country north of the White Mountains. 



All of the most important companies in New England using large 

 water powers have put themselves on record as indorsing a method 

 of control of the forests that will preserve their powers through preser- 

 vation of the forest. 



WATER-POWER DEVELOPMENT. 



A brief description of the water-power development on each of the 

 five large rivers flowing from the White Mountain region will bring 

 into clear view the interstate features of this water-power problem 

 and call attention to the vast amount of business and its wide rami- 

 fications that depend upon the protection of the sources of power. 



CONNECTICUT RIVER. 



The Connecticut rises in the extreme northern portion of New 

 Hampshire, within half a mile of the Canadian border, and flows 

 south for 300 miles to Long Island Sound. The river itself, if the 

 bends are followed, is about 375 miles long. It forms the boundary 

 between New Hampshire and Vermont for 180 miles and for 120 

 miles traverses Massachusetts and Connecticut. Its total drainage 



[Cir. 168] 



