Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 46.djvu/607

Rh by the tiller of the soil, left behind him no disastrous traces of' his presence, or, if a conflagration sometimes followed his camp fires, it occurred but seldom, and was never intentional. Both the aboriginal wood-dweller and his venatic successors looked upon the forest as the gift of the Great Spirit, to be reverenced by man as a sign of the bounty of a beneficent Creator, and not to be wantonly desecrated.

The practice of burning the old and dry grass in unoccupied lands, in order that a younger and more tender growth may give pasture to cattle, is still common in some of our States, and its results, though of benefit to a few, are disastrous to the general welfare. In Florida the cattle men have long been omnipotent. They have sway in the Legislature, which enacts laws to suit their wishes, even to the extent of prohibiting towns and villages from passing ordinances to prohibit the running at large of cattle. A considerable portion of the State is thus annually burned over. Nor is it the grass alone that burns, but fire communicates to the pine trees, thousands of which yearly succumb. Meantime fences must be maintained to keep out cattle commoners, only to be often burned in their turn. Worse than all, the humus in the sandy soil is burned out, and the future wealth and resources of the State are destroyed, to privilege a few, whose entire interests are not a thousandth part in value of the ruin they accomplish. At this day and everywhere may be encountered tracts of utterly barren and worthless land, in the midst of comparatively fertile, whose fertility has been thus destroyed. In northern California similar aggressions are committed by the sheep-herders, and the Government reserves have to be protected by the army, acting as patrols.

There is another aspect more important even than the value of the pecuniary loss to the country from the extraordinary and rapid consumption of its forests, and which still more strongly concerns the future of the nation. I refer to the effects of deforestation upon the climate and soils.

Although there is not entire agreement among scientists as to the effect of the removal of forests upon the climate, and especially the rainfall, the following propositions seem to be well established:

 1. That the temperature is hotter in summer and colder in winter than when the country was covered with forests. This is a natural result of exposure of the soil to more active radiation and consequent frost. 2. The winds have a more uninterrupted sweep, and so the country is both dried up and refrigerated. 3. The rainfall is either less in amount, or its advantages are to a great degree lost. Forests retain the moisture that falls and do not allow it to go to waste.