President Cleveland for his forestry. policy in creating the first forest reserves, some eighteen million acres, and in the face of the most violent oppositionthe opposition of ignorance and misunderstanding. President Roosevelt, however, has made a close study of the forestry and irrigation questions. His recommendations and public utterances on these subjects are notable. His last message to Congress contains the following comprehensive paragraph:

Preservation of Forests

"The study of the opportunities of reclamation (irrigation) of the vast extent of arid

beyond the experimental stage, and has reached a condition where scientific methods are essential to its successful prosecution. The administrative features of forest reserves are at present unsatisfactory, being divided between three Bureaus of two Departments. It is therefore recommended that all matters pertaining to forest reserves, except those involving or pertaining to land titles, be consolidated in the Bureau of Forestry of the Department of Agriculture."

A bill is now pending in Congressthe result of the work of a commission appointed by President Roosevelt, of which Mr. Pinchot is a member-repealing the Timber and Stone Law, under which timber land can be purchased at $2.50 an acre, though much of this land is said to be worth $50 and even $100 an The danger in the Timber and Stone Law lies not only in the actual

acre.

PLANTING A SLOPE WITH TREE SEEDS. San Gabriel Reserve, California.

land, shows that, whether this reclamation is done by individuals, corporations, or the State, the source of water supply must be effectively protected and the reservoirs guarded by the preservation of the forests at the headwaters of the streams. The engineers making the preliminary examinations continually emphasize this need, and urge that the remaining public lands at the head-waters of the important streams of the West be reserved to insure permanency of water supply for irrigation. Much progress in forestry has been made during the past year. The necessity for perpetuating our forest resources, whether in public or private hands, is recognized as never before. The demand for forest reserves has become insistent in the West, because the West must use the water, wood, and summer range which only such reserves can supply. gressive lumbermen are striving, through forestry, to give their business permanence. Other great business interests are awakening to the need of forest preservation as a business matter. The Government's forest work should receive from the Congress hearty support, and especially support adequate for the protection of the forest reserves against fire. The forest reserve policy of the Government has passed

Pro

A 400-ACRE CATALPA FOREST IN KANSAS.
Trees about twelve years old.

money loss to the Government in selling valuable property for a pittance, but in the resulting denudation of timber tracts. This bill has already passed the Senate. It provides for the sale of government timber at its worth, and places the proceeds in the Irrigation reclamation fund. This process will therefore simply divert money received from one Western re

Government has lost in actual cash between one hundred millions and one hundred and fifteen millions of dollars.

Much opposition to the repeal of this law has developed, just as there has been opposition to the proposed repeal of the Desert Land Law and the commutation clause of the Homestead Law, under which an equal squandering of the remaining natural resources of the Government is rapidly proceeding; but the opposition to this proposed reform comes from the sections in which live the men who are benefiting by them. These men are large operators, and powerful factors

United States shall be jealously guarded and administered for the benefit of the whole people and for the good of the nation rather than in the interests of private speculation, and with the continuance and enlargement of the plan of government reclamation of the Great American Desert through irrigation, these two important internal policies of the United States will go down the decades and centuries as the most beneficent and farreaching, in their results for good, of any of the great schemes for American development to-day advocated by economists and statesmen.

T

HE SUBMARINE MINE, which had its practical applicacation first during the Civil War, has become to-day a very potent instrument of destruction, as shown by both the Russian and the Japanese losses in the present war, which have proved so expensive in both life and treasure.

The Birth of the Mine

The submarine mine, or, as it was known in the days of the Civil War, the "torpedo," was born of necessity, and, during the years of that conflict, was peculiarly the weapon of the weaker side. Federal naval officers were led at first to belittle this system of defense; but after the Union cause had lost no fewer than twenty-two vessels and had had a dozen seriously injured, not to mention the loss of life-a record much more disastrous

Mine Case

Anchop

CONTACT MINE.

Mine case held by cable just below surface. Anchor rests on bottom.

than that of any gun-fire-the submarine acquired a formidable dignity that has grown to-day to an exalted dread. Would space permit, it would be very instructive. to trace the development of the submarine mine under the stress of the Confederacy's struggle-a record of varied and

Diagrams from "Textbook Ordnance and Gunnery." by Lieut.-Commander W. F. Fullam and Lieut. T. C. Hart, U. S. N.

ingenious appliances that stands without a parallel in the annals of civilized warfare; but space does forbid, and the list of Federal losses tells plainly enough the deadly might of the crude, powder-filled, passive obstructions of a hard-pressed but fertile foe forty-odd years ago. Today, gun-cotton-substantially unaffected

MINE-LAYING VESSEL.

Mines, with anchors, are dropped successively by means of traveling belt as vessel moves ahead.

by water has supplanted the short-lived, damp-killed powder of the past; and, in replacing that old explosive, has brought to the modern mine, pound for pound of charge, a destructive might four times as great.

Its Defensive Character

The submarine mine, unlike the torpedo of to-day, must be sought by the foe; and its prime weakness, of course, lies in its immobility. Secrecy of emplacement and well-guarded approach are vital to its efficiency; and, for this reason, the present mine is only one part of an extensive system of defense, instead of the prime obstruction, as it was during the days of the Rebellion.

The modern submarine mine differs in character with the work for which it is designed; and, broadly, the distinction is

made between those intended to explode by direction from an observation station ashore, and those that are fired automatically upon contact with the bottom of an enemy's ship.

It has become axiomatic in military circles that "the defensive can only avoid defeat; it cannot win victory." Such, in substance, is the mission of all our fortified seaports. The batteries there can only repel the foe; they cannot go forth as a fleet, and wring victory from the enemy: at most, they can prevent a determined naval antagonist from running. by at all hazard to reach the cities lying back of these bulwarks. The prime object, then, is to prevent this; and to that end, the aim is so to limit and obstruct

retaliation of his own guns-in other words, to hold him at arm's length, and to cripple him beyond thought of further

Single Cable

Single Disconnecto

Multiple Disconnector

Group Cuble

JUNCTION-BOX OF MINE SYSTEM.

venture. The second line of mine defense is to detain the enemy still further, and to hold him in the face of the combined attack of all the guns-slow and rapid-fire and effectually to check the

CIRCUIT CLOSER PEDESTAL

OBSERVATION MINE.

the approach of a foe that he shall be forced to make a frontal attack in line with the heaviest and the most powerful of the defending ordnance.

First and Second Lines

To accomplish this, submarine mines. of various sorts are planted throughout the waters leading to a fortified position. By thus covertly guarding the flanking avenues of approach, it is possible to bring to bear upon an enemy a superior force at the point of attack. To this end, the navigable waters leading to a fortified position would be planted with a double line of mine defenses, the first line seaward, or distant from the heavygun emplacements, about 3,500 yards. At that range, the most powerful of the guns should be able to pierce the heaviest of the enemy's armor, and, before he could come closer, the aim would be to destroy his stability, injure his manoeuvering powers, and thus prevent the successful

teries of rapid-fire guns and searchlights are installed to sweep all avenues of approach, and effectually to repel the small craft, to whom such work is generally intrusted by the foe. The aim is not only to destroy all vessels attempting this work, but to hold such craft at a distance so that they shall not be able even to

an enemy's approach. For this reason, the mines planted in a harbor-way or the navigable waters of seaboard ports, are placed deeper than the type designed commonly to explode on contact; and, to make them effective, they carry a much larger explosive charge, must be structurally stronger to withstand the water pressure at the greater depths, and are, in consequence, very heavy. In fact, the large, modern observation mines weigh quite half a ton, and their proper planting involves a deal of careful handling and a wealth of special facilities that cannot be enumerated in a brief sketch of the subject. Let us dwell, instead, upon the principal features of the mines themselves, which, while differing in minor details in most countries-the secrets of which are sooner or later known to all military experts-are fundamentally the same, for the fields of employment remain identical and fairly constant.

EXPLOSION OF CONTACT MINE LOADED WITH 75 POUNDS OF GUN-COTTON.

locate the position of the mine fields; for it is in the secret, hidden nature of such defenses that their moral force lies, even more than in their applied destructive power.

Systems of Planting

The work of planting a mine field involves no little preparation, for, as must be understood, the modern mine is rather complex in its installation in the fairways of commerce; and, of course, the idea today is to provide an efficient defense while still leaving the channels of traffic open to free passage during daylight and at such other times as may be secure from

ELECTRO-MECHANICAL MINE.

Observation Mines

Taking the mines in their order of relative safety to those planting them, the Observation mine naturally comes first. This type of mine is shown in accompanying diagram (p. 139). The casing is of steel, and large enough to be buoyant when loaded with 500 pounds of wet gun-cotton, packed in a copper vessel with perforations permitting the entrance of sea water. In the lower center is the primer of dry gun-cotton, and the detonator of fulminate of mercury. The area of destruction of such a mine is a circle with a 60-foot diameter. These mines