Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 5.djvu/51

Rh because the cutting had been done upon rational principles and the forests had been steadily improved by scientific cultivation. I passed over a large tract I had known as a barren heath, the heath of Lüneburg, which formerly, as the saying was, sustained only the “Heidschnucken,” a species of sheep as little esteemed for their wool as their mutton—the same heath now covered with a dense growth of fine forest. Instead of sneering, our supercilious scoffers would do better for themselves as well as for the country if they devoted their time a little more to studying and learning the valuable lessons with which the experience of other countries abounds.

What the result of my appeals was at the time I am speaking of, you know. We succeeded in limiting somewhat the extent of the depredations upon the public forests, and in bringing some of the guilty parties to justice. A few hundred thousand dollars were recovered for timber stolen, but the recommendations of rational forestry legislation went for nothing. Some laws were indeed passed, but they appeared rather to favor the taking of timber from the public lands than to stop it. Still, I persevered, making appeal after appeal, in public and in private, but I found myself standing almost solitary and alone. Deaf was Congress, and deaf the people seemed to be. Only a few still voices rose up here and there in the press in favor of the policy I pursued.

Thank Heaven, the people appear to be deaf no longer. It is in a great measure owing to your wise and faithful efforts that the people begin to listen, and that in several States practical steps have already been taken in the right direction.

As the chairman very truthfully and pointedly said, the forestry question divides itself into two branches, preservation and restoration. The first appears at present by far the most important. There are forests in this as