39 



wish to utilize tliem. If there be no way to get the States to look after 

 the matter themselves the Federal Government should take some steps 

 toward reforesting the headwaters of our great navigable streams where 

 they have been cleared off, and nothing is being done to protect them. 

 Surely it is as legitimate to expend Federal money to keep the soil from 

 flowing down our mountain sides and filling up our rivers as it is to ex- 

 pend money in clearing out their channels when once filled. It is surely 

 permissible to expend Federal money to protect the stream itself if it 

 be proper to stock and restock it with fish. 



Our State governments should do the rest, and should begin soon. 

 The expense of such a system, properly organized and carried out, will 

 be defrayed ten thousand times by the great increase in national wealth 

 and national health which will ensue, while the loss incident to a per- 

 sistence in our present policy will be simply incalculable. 



