USES OF THE FORESTS.

1. Forests create or gradually but constantly improve a soil. The roots penetrate deeply into the ground, and thus let in the air to produce its slow but sure effects. The radicles decompose the grains of sand, and extract from them some of the elements essential to a soil; they drink in moisture and the carbonic acid which has been formed beneath, or brought down from the atmosphere above, the surface; and from these several elements, acted on by heat, light and air, in the leaves, and by that unknown influence, vegetable life, are formed the various substances which compose the plant. The annual deposit of leaves, and the final decay of the branches and trunk, go to constitute the mould upon which other plants grow. And the soil thus formed is kept by the thick matting of the roots from washing away.

An unprotected hill soon loses its soil. Every rain bears away a portion, till it becomes a bare rock, and the slow process must recommence by which rock had been originally converted into soil. That process takes place slowly on all uncovered rocks, but far more surely and rapidly under cover of trees. There also the invisible sporule, borne thither on the wind, perhaps, from a distant continent, attaches itself to the naked rock and vegetates; encrusting its surface with a lichen which gets thence a foothold and an alkali, while it lives on the atmosphere. From the thin layer left by its decay, another species springs, which in turn gives place to mosses and herbaceous plants. Whoever has climbed Monument Mountain in Stockbridge, has had an opportunity of observing this process in its different stages and circumstances. On the projecting cliffs of white quartz, of which the mountain consists, the beautiful lichens which paint its sides have made no more progress than if the mountain had been thrown up two years ago. They are spread upon it as thin as paper, and perfectly fresh. Wherever they decay, the violence of the rain and winds washes them clean off, and the work is begun each year anew. But in the protected crevices, and under shelter of the few trees

and shrubs that have found root-hold there, a soil is forming or is already formed. What happens here takes place on all mountain tops in New England. A sheltering tree allows the creative action to take place.

2. Another use of forests is to serve as conductors of electricity between the clouds and its great reservoir the earth; thus giving activity to the vital powers of plants, and leading the clouds to discharge their contents upon the earth. A few tall trees on the summit of a hill are sufficient to produce this effect. A charged thunder cloud, which passes unbroken over a bare hill, will pour down its moisture, if its electricity is drawn off by these natural conductors. The dry sterility of some parts of Spain, anciently very fertile, is probably owing, in a great degree, to the improvident destruction of the forests, and the absurd laws which discourage their renewal. The forests also coat the earth and keep it warm in winter, shutting in the central heat which would otherwise more rapidly radiate into space and be lost. If you go into the woods at the end of a severe winter, you may any where easily drive down a stake without impediment from the frost; while, in the open field by their edge, you find a foot or more of earth frozen solid. Forests act not less favorably as a protection against the excessive heat of the summer's sun, which rapidly evaporates the moisture and parches up the surface. The first mahogany cutters in Honduras found the cold under the immense forests so great, that they were obliged, though within 160 of the equator, to kindle fires to keep themselves warm. * The rain, falling on the woods of a hill side, is retained by the deep and spongy mass formed by the roots and the accumulated deposit of leaves, instead of rushing down, as it otherwise would, in torrents, carrying with it great quantities of loose soil. Protected also from rapid evaporation, it remains laid up as in a reservoir, trickling gradually out and forming perennial streams, watering and fertilizing the

*"At Guiana, in South America, within 5° of the line, the inhabitants living amid immense forests, a century ago, were obliged to alleviate the severity of the cold by evening fires. Even the duration of the rainy season has been shortened by the clearing of the country, and the warmth is so increased, that a fire now would be deemed an annoyance."-Ure's Dictionary of Chemistry,—article, Climate.

low country through the longest summers, and moderating the violence of droughts by mists and dews. All along the coast of New England, numerous little streams, which were formerly fed by the forests, and often rolled a volume of water sufficient to turn a mill in summer, are now dried up at that season, and only furnish a drain for the melting snows of spring, or the occasional great rains of autumn.

Forests thus equalize the temperature and soften the climate, protecting from the extremes of cold and heat, dryness and humidity. There is little doubt that, if the ancient forests of Spain could be restored to its hills, its ancient fertility would return. Now, there is nothing to conduct electricity, nothing to arrest the clouds and make them pour their treasures upon the earth, no reservoirs to lay up the winter's rain in store against the droughts of summer.

3. Forests protect a country from the violence of winds. The lively author of "Life in Mexico" writes, " M. de Humboldt, who examined the will of Cortes, informs us that the conqueror had left sugar plantations near Cuyoacan, in the valley of Mexico, where now, owing, it is supposed, to the cutting down of the trees, the cold is too great for sugar cane or any other tropical production to thrive." And a most intelligent gentleman in Worcester tells me, that he attributes the greater difficulty now experienced in the cultivation of the more delicate fruits in that town, to the fact, that the encircling hills, formerly crowned with trees, are now, to a considerable degree, laid bare. The laws of the motion of the atmosphere are similar to those of water. A bare hill gives no protection. The wind pours over it as water pours over a dam. But if the hill be capped with trees, the windy cascade will be broken as into spray. Its violence will be sensibly diminished. We are not aware, on the now protected and irregular surface of New England, how important are the screens furnished by the forests. Travellers from Illinois tell us, that on the vast prairies in that and some of the other western States, the wind is almost always fresh, and often blows a gale, before which men can hardly

* Volume II., p. 52.

stand. The new settlers are glad to shelter their habitations under the lea of the spurs of forest which stretch like promontories into the prairie lands. A forest near the coast, in any part of New England, protects those farther inland from the chilling east winds; and, while such winds prevail, a person passing towards the sea, experiences a marked change of temperature, upon crossing the last wood and especially the last wood-covered hill. One who would have his house screened from the northerly winds, must take care to have behind it a hill crowned with trees, or at least to have a wood stretching from the northwest to the northeast. A garden surrounded by tall trees admits the cultivation, even in our severe climate, of plants almost tropical.

Forests not only protect from winds; they must prevent their formation. The air resting over a broken surface cannot be rapidly heated to a uniformly high temperature, so as to rise upwards in great masses and create a violent wind.*

4. As adding to the beauty of a country, the forests are of the utmost importance. A country destitute of them cannot be in the highest degree beautiful. If the green hills of Berk

* A writer in the 6th volume of the N. E. Farmer, says, "It is not merely in forests, nor as supplying fire wood and timber that trees are valuable. Considered agriculturally,' says an English writer, 'the advantages to be derived from subdividing extensive tracts of country by plantations are evidently great, whether considered in the light of affording immediate shelter to the lands, or in that of improving the local climate. The fact that the climate may be thus improved, has, in very many instances, been sufficiently established. It is indeed astonishing how much better cattle thrive in fields even but moderately sheltered, than they do in an open, exposed country. In the breeding of cattle, a sheltered farm, or a sheltered corner in a farm, is a thing much prized; and in instances where fields are taken by the season for the purpose of fattening cattle, those most sheltered never fail to bring the highest rents. . . . Dr. Deane has observed, 'pasture lands should be well fenced, in small lots, and these lots should be bordered at least, with rows of trees. It is best that trees of some kind or other should be growing scattered in every point of a pasture, so that cattle may never have far to go, in a hot hour, to obtain a comfortable shade."

...

"Small lots, thus sheltered, are not left bare of snow so early in the spring as larger ones lying bare; since fences and trees cause more of it to remain on the ground. The cold winds in March and April hurt the grass much when the ground is bare; and the winds in winter will not suffer snow to lie deep in land that is too open to the rake of winds and storms.”—N. E. F., VI., 350.

shire were stripped of their woods, they would be converted into broad reaches of upland, from which most of their beauty would have departed. The striking feature in that charming country is the old forest, on the sides of its hills, here and there irregularly broken in upon by cultivation. The northern and southern sides of Boston are not essentially unlike in their natural features; yet the hills of Brookline and Roxbury, capped with hickory, and whose sides are clothed with oaks and pines, give the impression of a rich and happy country, of which only pleasant memories are carried away, while the bare hills of Chelsea suggest images of bleak and barren desolation. Three or four trees upon Apple Island make it a gem among the islands in Boston Harbor. What a scene would the Bay present, if all the islands were so covered!

No element of beauty is so completely manageable as trees; and our resources in that respect are surprisingly great. Situated in the middle of the temperate zone, we have, in Massachusetts, all the best of the deciduous trees, the oaks, elms, beeches, ashes, hickories, walnuts, cherries, maples, the chestnut, linden and button-wood, of the temperate regions, together with the finest of the evergreens, the pines, firs, spruces, cedars and hemlock, and the delicate birches, of a more northern climate. Each one of these trees has its own peculiar and distinctly marked character, recognizable at a distance, and producing an effect which needs not to be mistaken for that of any other. Each has its own cycle of change, its own time of flowering, and of perfecting its fruit, and of opening, maturing, changing and casting its foliage. Each has its own shape and its own color, distinguishing it from every other tree, even of the species most nearly allied. Hence the endless variety of forest scenery. Here are more than fifty elements shading off and blending into each other in imperceptible gradations, according as you recede from the coast to the interior, as you go north or south, or as you rise from the plain into the mountains. We have here representatives of the vegetations of the warmer and of the colder regions; but as you go north, first the hickories, then most of the other nut-bearing trees, then others grad