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Show DESTRUCTION::' OF FORESTS-;: - -I-APPALLING; MILPJABS-OE COUNTRY DRAIN HEAVILY President Roosevelt Talks to Forest Congress on Necessity Neces-sity of Preserving Diminishing Dimin-ishing Timber Supply. ited to the period of "his own Ufa and w. cannot afford for one instant to forget that our country la only at the beginning of its growth. Unleaa the forests of the . United States can be made ready to meet the vast demands which this growth will inevitably bring-, commercial disaster is Inevitable. The railroads must have ties, and the best opinion of the experts is that no sub-stitute sub-stitute has been discovered which will satisfactorily replace the wooden tie. This is largely due to the great and continually con-tinually increasing speeds at which our trains are run. Needs of the Miner. The miner must have timber or he cannot can-not operate bis mine, and in very many cases the profit which mining- yields Is directly di-rectly proportionate to the cost of the timber supply. ' ' The farmer, east and west, must have timber for numberless uses on his farm, and he must be protected by forest cover upon the headwaters of the streams he uses against floods In the East and the lack of water for Irrig-atlon in the West. The eteckman must have fence posts, and very often he miist have summer range for his stock In the national forest reserves. In a word, both the production of the great staples upon, which .our, prosperity depends and ' their' movement . in commerce throughout the Vnited States are inseparably dependent upon the existence of permanent and suitable supplies sup-plies from the forest at a reasonable cost.' Famine Is Inevitable. If the present rate of forest destruction. Is allowed to continue, a timber- famine Is obviously ' inevitable. Fire, wasteful and destructive forms of lumbering and legitimate use are together destroying our forest resources far more rapidly than they are being replaced. What such a ' famine would mean to each of the industries indus-tries of the United States it Is scarce ly poBslble to imagine. And the period of recovery from the injuries which a timber tim-ber famine would entail would be measured meas-ured by the slow growth of the trees themselves. WASHINGTON. Jan. 5. The American Amer-ican Forest congress today held! the most important of its five days' sessions. ses-sions. The morning meeting was devoted de-voted to discussions of the relation of railroads and the forest The afternoon proceedings consisted of a special session marked by addresses address-es by President Roosevelt the French Embassador, President Hill of the Great Northern railroad, members of both houses of Congress and representatives represen-tatives of educational institutions, lumber lum-ber and live stock interests. The President said in part: It is a pleasure to greet the members of the American Forest congress. You have made, by your coming, a meeting which ts without parallel In the history of forestry. for-estry. For the first time the great 'business 'busi-ness and the forest interests of the Nation Na-tion have Joined together, through delegates dele-gates altogether worthy of the organisations organisat-ions they represent, to consider their individual in-dividual and their common interests in the forest. This meeting may well be called a congress of forest users, for that you are users of the forest come together to consider how best to combine use -with -conservatism is, to me. full of the most hopeful possible promise for our forests. Failed to Realize Relation, The producers, the manufacturers ' and the great common carriers of the Nation had long failed to realise their true and vital relation to the great forests of the United States, and forests and industries both suffered from that failure. But the time of indifference and misunderstanding misunderstand-ing has gone by. Tour coming is a very great step toward the solution of the for- ; est problem, a problem which cannot be settled until It la settled right. And it cannot be settled right until the forces which bring that settlement about come, not from the Government, not even from the newspapers and public sentiment in general, but from the active, intelligent and effective interest of the men to whom the forest is important from the business point of view, because they use it and its products, and whose Interest Is therefore concrete instead of general and diffuse. What Will Determine. I do not In the least - underrate the power of the awakened public opinion, but in the final test It will be the attitude of the industries of the country which more than anything else will determine whether or not our forests are to be preserved. pre-served. This is true because by far the greater part of all our forests must pass Into the hands of forest users, whether directly or through the Government which will continue to hold some of them, but only as trustee. The forest is for use, and its users will decide Its future. The great significance of this congress comes from the fact that henceforth the movement for the conservative use of the forest is to come mainly from within, not from without: from the men who are actively ac-tively interested in the use of the forest In one way or another, even more than from those whose Interest is philanthropic and general. The difference between more agitation and actual execution, between the hope of accomplishment and the thing done. Forces Set in Motion. We believe that at last forces have been set In motion which will convert the only distant prospect of the conservation of the forest by wise use Into the practical accomplishment ac-complishment of that great end; and ef this most hopeful and significant fact the coming together of this congress is the sufficient proof. The place -of the forest in the life of any nation Is far too large to be described In the time at my command. This Is par. tlcularly true of Its place In the United States. The great industries of agriculture, agricul-ture, transportation, mining, grating and. of course, lumbering, are each ona of them vitally and Immediately dependent upon wood, water or grass from the for-fst. for-fst. The manufacturing industries, whether or not which enters directly into their finished product, are scarcely, if at all, less dependent upon the forest than those whose connection with It is obvious and direct. Wood Is Indispensable. Wood Is an indispensable part of the material structure upon which civilisation civilisa-tion rests, and civilized life makes continually con-tinually greater demands, upon the forest. We use not less wood, but more. For example, ex-ample, although we consume relatively Mis wood and relatively more steel or brick or cement In certain industries than was once the case, yet in every Instance which I recall, while the relative proportion propor-tion is less the actual Increase in the amount of wood used Is very great Thus, the consumption of wood tn shipbuilding is far larger than It was before the discovery dis-covery of the art of building Iron ships, because vastly more ships are built larger larg-er supplies of building lumber are re quired, directly or Indirectly, for use In the construction of the brick and steel and stone structures of great modern cities, cit-ies, than were consumed by the comparatively compara-tively few and comparatively small wooden wood-en buildings In the earlter stages of these same cities. Whatever materials may be substituted for wood In certain uses, we may confidently expect that the total demand de-mand for wood will not diminish but steadily increase. Must Look to Future. It is a fair question, then, whether the vast demands of the future upon our forests for-ests are likely to be met. No man is a true lover of his country whose confidence confi-dence In its progress and. greatness is lim- I |