242 
TORRENTS IN FRANCE. 
descending from the Col Isoard, which he calls u a complete 
type of a basin of reception,” that is, a gorge which serves as 
a common point of accumulation and discharge for the waters 
of several lateral torrents. u The aspect ot the monstrous 
channel,” says he, “is frightful. Within a distance of less 
than three kilometres [= one mile and seven eighths English], 
more than sixty torrents hurl into the depths of the gorge the 
debris torn from its two flanks. The smallest of these sec¬ 
ondary torrents, if transferred to a fertile valley, would be 
enough to ruin it.” 
The eminent political economist Blanqui, in a memoir read 
before the Academy of Moral and Political Science on the 25th 
of November, 1843, thus expresses himself: “ Important as 
are the causes of impoverishment already described, they are 
not to be compared to the consequences which have followed 
from the two inveterate evils of the Alpine provinces of 
France, the extension of clearing and the ravages of torrents. 
* * The most important result of this destruction is this: 
that the agricultural capital, or rather the ground itself— 
which, in a rapidly increasing degree, is daily swept away by 
the waters—is totally lost. Signs of unparalleled destitution 
are visible in all the mountain zone, and the solitudes of those 
districts are assuming an indescribable character of sterility 
and desolation. The gradual destruction of the woods has, in 
a thousand localities, annihilated at once the springs and the 
fuel. Between Grenoble and Briangon in the valley of the 
Bomanche, many villages are so destitute of wood that they 
are reduced to the necessity of baking their bread with sun- 
dried cowdung, and even this they can afford to do but once 
a year. This bread becomes so hard that it can be cut only 
with an axe, and I have myself seen a loaf of bread in Septem¬ 
ber, at the kneading of which I was present the January 
previous. 
“ Whoever has visited the valley of Barcelonette, those of 
Embrun, and of Yerdun, and that Arabia Petroea of the de¬ 
partment of the Upper Alps, called Devoluy, knows that there 
is no time to lose, that in fifty years from this date France 
