The American continent is so vast, and so large a part of it is still
covered with wood, that men are not ready to believe there is any danger
of exterminating its forests. Supposing them to be inexhaustible, they
are entirely indiscriminate in their method of clearing them, and treat
them as if they were of no importance further than they subserve the
present wants of the community. They are either reckless or ignorant of
their indispensable uses in the economy of nature, and seem purposely to
shut their eyes to facts and principles in relation to them which are
well known to men of science. Our people look upon the forests as
valuable only so far as they supply material for the arts and for fuel,
for the construction of houses, ships, and public works; and as there is
not much danger of immediately exhausting the supplies for these
purposes, the public mind remains quiet, while certain operations are
going forward which, if not soon checked by some very powerful
restraint, will, before the lapse of another century, reduce half this
wide continent to a desert. The science of vegetable meteorology
deserves more consideration than it has yet received from our professors
of learning. This, if fully explained, would teach men some of the
fearful consequences that would ensue if a country were entirely
disrobed of its forests, and their relations to birds, insects, and
quadrupeds would explain the impossibility of ever restoring them. Man
has the power, which, if exercised without regard to the laws of nature,
may, at no very distant period, render this earth uninhabitable by man.
In his eagerness to improve his present condition, and his senseless
grasp for immediate advantages, he may disqualify the earth for a human
abode.
This matter has been strangely overlooked by legislators in the several
States, though frequently discussed by naturalists and philosophical
writers. In spite of the warnings the people have received from learned
men, very little thought has been given to the subject. How few persons
suspect that in less than a century the greatest affliction this country
is doomed to suffer may be caused by the destruction of its forests!
Springs once full all the year will be dry every summer and autumn;
small rivers will desert their channels; once profitable mill-privileges
will cease to be of any value; every shower will produce inundations;
every summer will be subject to pernicious droughts. The preservation of
the forests in a certain ratio over our whole territory ought to be the
subject of immediate legislation in all the States. It is not a part of
the plan of this work, however, to treat of woods as a subject of
political economy, but rather to prompt our wise men to protect them by
statute, by showing our dependence on them for our existence.
It has been said that the intelligence of an educated and civilized
community like our own ought to save the country from this evil. But it
is our civilization that has created the very danger that threatens us.
A country, while it remains in the possession of barbarians, is never
disforested. It is a false assurance that the general intelligence of
the community will secure them from this danger, unless they have
studied the causes of it. A literary and even a scientific education, as
popularly conducted, does not imply any great amount of this kind of
knowledge. The intelligence of our people would undoubtedly prepare them
to understand the subject when explained to them by some one who has
made it his special study; but reading does not acquaint a person with
facts contained only in books which he never reads, though his habit of
reading only for amusement may keep him ignorant of many things which he
would otherwise learn from observation. The subject of this essay is not
sufficiently exciting to obtain a hearing from the public in a
lecture-room. Every avenue of popular information is so greatly
obstructed by objects designed only to afford amusement, that science
and philosophy, save those branches which some eloquent work has
rendered fashionable, have but very little chance to be heard. Even
among our literary classes, if you speak of trees and woods, there is
only an occasional individual of eccentric habits who seems capable of
taking any other than an æsthetic view of their relations to human
wants.
But it will be said, if a liberal education does not supply men with the
right kind of knowledge on this point, certainly our _practical men_
will understand it. They, I admit, would see at once how much money
could be made by cutting down all the trees in any given tract of
forest; but they are not the men to be consulted respecting the
advantage of any scheme that does not promise to be a profitable
investment of capital. Our practical men are the very individuals from
whose venal hands it is necessary to protect our forests by legislation.
In France, where great evils have followed the destruction of woods,
laws have been enacted for restoring and preserving them in certain
situations. These laws, however, originated, not with practical men, but
with Napoleon III., who obtained his views from men of science. Our
people have less knowledge of this subject than the Europeans, who have
been compelled to study it by the presence of evils which the Americans
are just beginning to experience.
The sentiment of the American public seems to have been excited in favor
of trees individually considered, rather than forests. People look upon
trees as their friends; and more indignation is generally caused by the
felling of a single large tree standing in an open field or by the
roadside, than by the destruction of whole acres of woods. Our love of
trees is a sort of passion; but we need yet to learn that a wood on a
steep hillside is of more importance than as many standards as there are
trees in the same wood, scattered upon a plain. This æsthetic sentiment
seems to be the only conservative principle that has yet produced any
considerable effect in preserving trees and groves. It often extends to
groups of trees, and sometimes to large assemblages, especially on
estates which have remained through several generations in the
possession of one family. But generally the avarice or the necessity of
our farmers has been more powerful to devastate, than the taste and
sentiment of others to preserve our woods.
I have long been persuaded that, unless the governments of the several
States should make this a subject of special legislation, the security
of our forests must depend on men of large property in land. Men of
wealth, if not learned, are generally in communication with men of
learning, from whom they may obtain a knowledge of vegetable
meteorology, and not being obliged, by pecuniary necessity, to cut down
their woods, will, from a sense of their importance in the economy of
nature, become their preservers. The wealth and taste of certain
families in every town and village will save a great many trees, groves,
and fragments of forest. But if our law-makers neglect to legislate for
this end, we must look to the possessors of immense estates, the lords
of whole townships, for the preservation of any large tracts of forest.