Hillard & Dixon, Pakenham. 2,000 McKillip & Gordon, Paltenham. J. G. Campbell, Perth.. Gillies Bros., Perth.......... J. Jackson, Perth. W. Steadman, Perth.. Perley & Pattee, Ottawa..... J. R. Booth, Ottawa.. Bronson & Weston, two mills, Ottawa. A. H. Baldwin, Ottawa.... Levi Young, Ottawa.. 2,000 Balson & Currier, [Hull] Ottawa.. H. Crandall & Co., [Hull] two mills, Ottawa. Jas. Skead, Napean Mills, Ottawa.. Conway Estate, Ottawa... J. McLaren & Co., Ottawa... 12,000 The mills enumerated above manufactured, during 1874, in the aggregate, 112,000,000 deals for the European market. In addition there are seventy-three mills about and below Quebec which stock almost exclusively for the European market, or the South American and Australian trade, though we find among their product 23,000,000 feet that might, if the demand were good, go to the United States. This stock was made, doubtless, for the southern trade, and, that call being already overstocked, it has mostly been held in reserve. To show the cause, we find the South American, etc., shipments In 1874 have been but 16,975,000 against 41,044,000 in 1873, while nothing to speak of has gone to Australia. RECAPITULATION OF CANADA PINE LUMber, deals, TIMBER, ETC., FOR 1874. In preceding chapters of this history the reader has found figures epitomizing the production of lumber in the districts above named in years later than 1874. A comparison will show the changes in the industry in Canada between 1874 and 1905. Many names of importance in 1874 will be found to have been still prominent in 1905. CHAPTER XXVI. UNITED STATES-FOREST RESOURCES. The beginning of the Twentieth Century marked, with approximate accuracy, an epochal period in the timber and lumber history of the United States of America. Until that time the country, in its use of forest products, had been drawing upon a surplus, but thereafter a continuance of production on the former scale, without adequate care for the perpetuation or reproduction of the forests, necessarily would draw upon the capital fund, so to speak, with the inevitable result of a growing scarcity of forest products, or, to be more exact, of an increasing and manifest deficiency in the supply of standing timber from which the product must be secured. Not only were the forests in surplus supply; that is to say, occupying a greater territory and in larger quantity than were necessary, provided their natural growth should be maintained, to supply in perpetuity the national requirement, but they were, especially during the period of development up to about 1850, in many instances a positive detriment. Forests stood on millions of acres of fertile lands which were needed by the settler and the would-be farmer, and a slow-growing crop of timber was occupying land that might more profitably be devoted to the annual production of grain or other products of agriculture. Unfortunately there has never been a timber census of the United States, nor even any very trustworthy estimate either of acreage or volume; but the best informed students of the subject believe, after as careful investigations as they have been able to make, that the forests. yet remaining, if operated along conser 'ative lines, would annually produce in perpetuity an amount of forest "roducts little, if any, more than the present annual output. If that be. 1e, the United States has come to the point where it can no longer be lavish in its use of its wonderful timber resources, but must rigorously conserve them. It no longer will be consuming a surplus, but, except for the adoption of forestry methods, will be drawing upon its capital. It seems fitting therefore, that, at such a turning point in the life of this great and fundamental industry, a study should be made of its his tory in order that those concerned-and every one is directly or indirectly concerned in this subject-may look forward from the vantage point of knowledge and recorded experience. To afford such a vantage ground is one of the objects of this work, which must be a record not merely of men and of events, but also of conditions. In previous chapters we have outlined the forestal condition of the North American continent and of the present United States as it was when the white race began its work of discovery, exploration and conquest. But it is necessary to go more minutely into the subject in this chapter than heretofore. In undertaking to state with some definiteness the original location, extent and quality of the forests within the present area of the United States, the historian is confronted with a task impossible of complete execution. The available records do not show with preciseness the limits of the forested areas nor the exact location and size of the treeless areas within them, and the research and exhaustive personal work necessary to determine these facts would, perhaps, not be worth the while. But it is possible to give an outline of these primary facts sufficiently exact to serve the purpose of comparison and, perhaps, to accomplish all that is desirable in this connection. Further, it is necessary to determine, with as much exactness as possible, the present forestal condition of the country, and to measure its timber resources. This task is as more difficult than the former one as it is more important. Upon it many able investigators have centered their attention, and yet, so inadequate and incomplete are the data, that no certain result is to be obtained-only an estimate more or less reliable according to the personal knowledge of the estimator and the thoroughness and skill with which he collects the available facts and draws his conclusions. The personal equation must be considered also. With the best of intentions the pessimist and alarmist will underestimate the amount of standing timber, and so exaggerate the seriousness of the exigency. On the other hand, the optimist is likely to magnify the favorable facts and minimize the unfavorable ones. It is the endeavor in this chapter to avoid either extreme and to reach conclusions through no other means than an impartial study of the existing and recognized facts and a study of the methods, arguments and conclusions of those who have hitherto undertaken this task. FOREST ENVIRONMENT OF EARLY EXPLORERS. To those discoverers and explorers who approached the United. States from the East the forests seemed illimitable. True, the French explorers, like Marquette, Joliet, LaSalle and Tonti, found in the Mississippi Valley extensive prairie areas, but it is doubtful if they saw many of these, for their travels were as far as possible by water, and the waterways were always adorned and sheltered by trees; and, further, they did not go into the true plains country, for Illinois was nearly or quite half covered with forests, and eastern Iowa in those early days indicated little of the real character of most of the area of that great State. Those who approached the continent from the Pacific found wide, open valleys, sterile mountain tops and barren plains, but the coast itself extended the welcome of the forest, and the valleys and the peaks were bordered or surrounded by forests which today are the wonders of the arboreal kingdom. It was only the Spaniards who, like Coronado, entered the country from New Spain, that encountered the great treeless plains. While, therefore, it was soon a matter of common knowledge that in the remote West there were treeless and even desert areas, the colonists on the eastern coast-those to whose labors is due the foundation of that great community which later became the United States-personally knew only of the forest, which, so far as their own explorations informed them, stretched indefinitely into the interior. Months of travel and hundreds of toilsome leagues did not serve to release them from the forest environment. Therefore, to the settler the forest, although a protection and a support to the hunter and trapper, became an enemy to be fought and conquered before a higher civilization could be established. DIVISIONS OF FOREST AREAS. From the time of the first exploration and settlement of the United States until the present, there has been comparatively little change in the location and outline of the areas that may be called wooded. Notwithstanding the clearing of hundreds of thousands of square miles, so that the passengers on the railways may now travel for hours without seeing more than occasional groves or groups of woodland where once a continuous forest shaded the soil, the characteristics of the timber soil still remain. The greatest changes have, perhaps, been in the prairie region, where windbreaks and wood lots now abound and break the monotony of a landscape which once interposed no obstacle between the eye and the circling horizon. Though no census relating to the facts has been made, it is a matter of common knowledge that in |