lars. We have no statement of the number 

 of locomotives, but allowing half to be wood 

 burners, and wood at $4 to the cord, there 

 will be required for railroad fuel alone, about 

 a million of cords of wood annually. Add 

 to these items the amount of lumber and tim- 

 ber used for fences, bridges, and other struc- 

 tures, and we shall find that it requires not 

 less than 50,000 acres of woodland a year, to 

 supply the demand for railroad use alone' in 

 the State of New York. 



If we take into account the vast consump- 

 tion for farm fences, for fuel and for building 

 purposes, and the vast amount required to 

 supply the various manufactories of wooden 

 wares and implements, and which are steadily 

 increasing in number and magnitude, we shall 

 begin to realize the stern realities before us, 

 and should stop to consider the remedies that 

 may be applied. 



There are also considerations of the influ- 

 ence of the forests upon climate, and results i 

 that have been observed to follow their de- 

 struction, which claim our careful attention. 

 It is a matter of common observation, that as 

 our woodlands are cleared away the swamps 

 and rills which feed the streams, diminish or 

 disappear. Mills built upon streams which 

 in the early settlement of the country, afforded 

 an abundant water power throughout the 

 year, must now stop from want of water in 

 the summer months, or use steam power dur- 

 ing a part of the year. The feeders of our 

 State Canals diminish, and new sources of 

 supply must be sought. Springs and wells 

 fail, and the increasing population of our 

 cities and large towns, finds more and more 

 difficulty every year, in obtaining thesupplies 

 of pure and wholesome water, so essential to 

 health and happiness. 



In warmer climates, the effects of this cut- 

 ting off of forests become still more apparent, 

 and we -will notice two or three instances in 

 which the disasters following this improvi- 

 dent destruction of timber have been most 

 sadly realized. The Danish island of Santa 

 Cruz, in the West Indies, some twenty-five 

 years ago was a garden of freshness, beauty and 

 fertility. Woods covered the hills, trees were 

 everywhere abundant, and the rains profuse 

 and frequent. A gentleman of my acquaint- 

 ance who visited the island when in its great- 

 est beauty, was induced by the memory of its 

 loveliness, to resort thither a year or two 

 since, at a corresponding season of the year, 

 to gratify his love of botanical study, and 

 revel in the floral beauties which his former 



experience had led him to anticipate. He 

 ' found a third of the island an utter desert. 

 The slurt, copious showers which frequently 

 occurred in former times, had ceased, and the 

 process of desiccation was gradually advanc- 

 ing, leaving a barreu waste except along the 

 sbore, where a narrow belt of green marked 

 the presence of the shrubs that flourish along 

 the high water mark of the sea shore. The 

 desolation came slowly but irresistibly. First 

 the sugar canes failed— then a meagre pastur- 

 age was maintained for a few years, and then 

 the desert, with its sparse and prickly vegeta- 

 tion of cactus and other worthless plants. 

 Some attempt had been made to stay the im- 

 pending ruin, and one planter had set out a 

 thousand trees — but everyone failed. 



The island of St. Thomas, some thirty miles 

 distant, is somewhat similarly affected, but , 

 being more broken, it receives more rain. 

 Fifty miles west is Porto Rico, largely cover- 

 ed with mountains, well supplied with for- 

 ests, and abundantly watered by rains. 



The island of Curacoa was, within the mem- 

 ory of living persons, a garden of fertility— 

 but now, whole plantations with their once 

 beautiful villas and terraced gardens, arc noth- 

 ing but an arid waste; and yet sixty miles 

 away, along the Spanish main, tbe rankest 

 vegetation covers the hills, and the burdened 

 clouds shower down al)undant blessings. 



The causes of these changes are directly at- 

 tributable to the cutting down of timber, and 

 in the smaller islands of tropical seas, where 

 irrigation is impossible, the injury may be al- 

 together beyond the power of man to repair. 



Palestine was anciently described as "a 

 good land, a land of brooks of water, of foun- 

 tains and depths that spring out of valley and 

 hills." (Deut. vlii, 7.) It was "a land that flow- 



eth with milk and honey a land of hills 



and valleys, and that drinketh water of the 

 rain of heaven." (Deut. xi, 9-11.) But the 

 vegetation which these conditions imply, has 

 largely disappeared, and with it in propor- 

 tional degree, "the rains of heaven." 



These instances might be multiplied to a 

 great extent — the experience of the world in 

 all climates tending to establish the same great 

 fact, that sterility and drouth are the natural 

 consequences of the destructioir of forests, 

 i There may be exceptional cases in which a 

 country exposed to warm ocean winds may 

 receive an adequate amount of rain-fall irre- 

 spective of its woodlands or open fields, and 

 we must admit that the normal quantity is 

 ■ much dependent upon distance from the sea, 



