of the island, where tradition says there 
was formerly a large forest.” The same 
story might be told even more forcibly 
of Asia-Minor, once the garden of the 
world, filled with densely-peopled 
towns, now for the most part treeless, 
waterless, sterile, and almost depopulat- 
ed. Of Spain it has been said that the 
loss of her wealth and power, and the 
decay of her Empire, were due more 
than anything else to the impoverish- 
ment of her soil through the destruction 
of her forests. Describing Central Spain 
Sir A. Ford writes: “The denuded table- 
lands are exposed to the fierce suns of 
the summer and to the fiercer snows and 
winds of winter, while the bulk of the 
peninsula offers a picture of neglect and 
desolation, moral and physical, which it 
is painful to contemplate. Extensive 
steppes and plains are burnt by the sun 
in summer and swept by the icy winds 
in winter; while rain ig so rare in the 
tablelands that the annual fall does not 
exceed 9 inches, and there are districts 
on which no shower descends for eight 
Or nine months together. The face of 
the earth is tanned tawny, and baked 
into a veritable ‘terra cotta, and every- 
thing seems dead and burnt as on a 
funeral pile.’ Mr G. Chisholm, one of 
the most eminent of living geographers, 
describing the basin of the Po, in North- 
ern Italy, says of the risk of floods to 
which it is constantly exposed:— 
“These dangers have been much increas- 
ed by the wanton destruction of the 
forests of the Alps and Apennines, for 
when the shelter of the woods is gone, 
the heavy raing of summer easily wash 
the soil from the slopes down into the 
rivers, and many an upland pasture has 
by this process been turned into bare 
rock.” Referring elsewhere to the 
malarial swamps in North Italy, the 
same authority writes:—‘Since ancient 
times, the extent of marsh has in many 
places been increased through the ex- 
cessive clearing of mountain forests, 
causing rain-water to rush unchecked 
down the mountain sides, and the rivers 
to swell into devastating floods.” 
ll 
THE CASE OF FRANCE. 
But perhaps the best illustration of the 
evils and dangers to which all countries 
are exposed by the process of deforesta- 
tion is to be found in the meteorological 
and topographical history of France 
during the past century. Dr. Croumbie 
. Brown, in his work on “Reboissement 
(reforestation) in France,’ gives a com- 
plete account of the causes that led to 
the clearing of the forests in the Lower 
Alps and the Pyrenees, and the results 
that followed in the form of landslips 
and floods. The details that he gives of 
the devastations committed by the 
mountain torrents, augmenting every 
year with the cutting out of forest and 
undergrowth form a picture that has 
been truthfully described as appalling. 
“The disappearance of the forests from 
the mountains,” writes Captain Camp- 
bell-Walker, “gave up the soil to the 
action of the waters which swept it 
away into the valleys, and then the 
torrents, becoming more and more devas- 
tating, buried extensive tracts under 
their deposits, tracts which will prob- 
ably be for ever withdrawn from agricul- 
ture.” And not only has irreparable in- 
jury been thus inflicted upon the coun- 
try, but enormous losses of property, 
and even of human life, have been sus- 
tained as a direct consequence of these 
same baneful causes. During 1875 the 
loss of property in the South of France 
through floods was estimated by the 
State at £3,000,000, and in addition at 
least 3,000 people lost their lives. 
“The indirect results in the shape of 
temporary or permanent damage to agri- 
cultural districts -by the deposit of 
stones and shingle brought from the 
mountains by the flood waters cannot 
be estimated, still less the damage to 
pastoral lands on the mountains them- 
selves. It may be stated generally that 
the results of excessive clearing of for- 
ests and abuse of pasturage on the 
French Alps and Pyrenees have reduced 
their capacity as a sheep and goat carry- 
ing area to such an extent that they 
cannot feed half the stock that grazed 
