Forestry. 97 



employes to protect and perpetuate the forests of the public 

 domain. But this great army would not be idlers. And notwith- 

 standing it would require large appropriations, it would repay the 

 outlay many thousand times in national wealth and national health. 

 Nothing short of an organized department of forestry can protect 

 and perpetuate this source of national wealth. The appropriation 

 for this department in France is five million dollars, and is returned 

 with good interest. Austria, not larger in extent of territory than 

 the States of Illinois and Iowa combined, maintains thirty-two 

 thousand forestry officers, and receives a large net income from this 

 source. And reports show that Germany has an annual income of 

 fifty-seven million dollars from her area of thirty-three million acres 

 of timber. And it is estimated that no more is harvested each year 

 than is compensated by growth and reoccupation of wasted ground. 



For forest preservation does not mean that trees shall not be cut 

 down ; but that they shall be used, while all the conditions for their 

 reproduction are steadily maintained from year to year. Conse- 

 quently forest preservation means protecting, and using if necessary, 

 an amount equal to the production by growth. This requires 

 planting, and tree-planting and forestry mean labor in this coun- 

 try as it does in Europe. The United States without Alaska is, I 

 believe, nineteen times larger in area than Germany. Therefore 

 to be proportionately equal with this foreign power, we should have 

 under control of the Government an area of seven hundred million 

 acres, as a reservation for timber to supply the public necessities of 

 the near future. 



According to geological and geographical surveys, we have six 

 hundred and forty million acres of arid treeless lands, incapable of 

 successful cultivation without irrigation (but where trees will grow, 

 for experiments have shown that trees will grow where the rainfall 

 is insufficient to insure crops of grain and grass). This arid tract of 

 our public domain should at once be made a field of labor with Gov- 

 ernment pay. It should be dedicated forever to the cultivation of 

 timber. First along the water-courses and most favorable positions, 

 and eventually through and over the more arid wastes, until the 

 nation is made rich in the act. 



The great railroad companies, also, should not delay in setting 

 apart at least one million acres of their lands for "God's first 

 temples" 



And here the labor question comes to the surface. For every 



