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navigation, and none of our rivers are navigated to more than a small fraction even of their effective low-water capacity.

The practical utility of streams for both navigation and power is measured by the effective low-water stage. The volume carried when the streams rise above this stage is largely wasted and often does serious damage. The direct yearly damage by floods since 1900 has increased steadily from $45,000,000 to over $238,000,000.

The freshets are attended by destructive soil erosion. The soil matter annually carried into lower rivers and harbors or into the sea is computed at 780,000,000 tons. Soil wash reduces by 10 or 20 per cent the productivity of upland farms and increases channel cutting and bar building in the rivers. The annual loss to the farms alone is fully $500,000,000, and large losses follow the fouling of the waters and the diminished navigability of the streams.

It is now recognized by statesmen and experts that navigation is interdependent with other uses of the streams; that each stream is essentially a unit from its source to the sea; and that the benefits of a comprehensive system of waterway improvement will extend to all the people in the several sections and States of the country.

The first requisite for waterway improvement is the control of the waters in such manner as to reduce floods and regulate the regimen of the navigable rivers. The second requisite is development of terminals and connections in such manner as to regulate commerce.

In forwarding to Congress, February 26, 1908, the Report of the Inland Waterways Commission, the President of the United States used the following language:

The report rests throughout on the fundamental conception that every waterway should be made to serve the people as largely and in as many different ways as possible. It is poor business to develop a river for navigation in such a way as to prevent its use for power, when by a little foresight it could be made to serve both purposes. We can not afford needlessly to sacrifice power to irrigation, or irrigation to domestic water supply, when by taking thought we may have all three. Every stream should be used to the utmost. No stream can be so used unless such use is planned for in advance. When such plans are made we shall find that, instead of interfering, one use can often be made to assist another. Each river system, from its headwaters in the forest to its mouth on the coast, is a single unit and should be treated as such. Navigation of the lower reaches of a stream can not be fully developed without the control of floods and low waters by storage and drainage. Navigable channels are directly concerned with the protection of source waters and with soil erosion, which takes the materials for bars and shoals from the richest portions of our farms. The uses of a stream for domestic and municipal water supply, for power, and in many cases for irrigation, must also be taken into full account.

Forest protection, without which river improvement can not be permanent, will at the same time help to postpone the threatened timber famine, and will secure us against a total dearth of timber by providing for the perpetuation of the remaining woodlands. Irrigation will create the means of livelihood for millions of people, and supplies of pure water will powerfully promote the public health. If the policy of waterway improvement here recommended is carried out, it will affect for good every citizen of the Republic. The National Government must play the leading part in securing the largest possible use of our waterways; other agencies can assist and should assist, but the work is essentially national in its scope.

In the report the following arguments in favor of forestry and conservation of water power are made:

Engineering works designed to improve navigation affect favorably the regimen of the streams, including floods and low waters. The annual floods of the United States occasion loss of property teaching many millions of dollars with considerable loss of life, while the low water of late summer involves large loss in diminished water supply, in reduced power, and in the fouling of streams, with consequent disease and death. It has been claimed that in specific cases the cost of works required both to control floods and meet the needs of commerce would be less than the amount of this loss. It is desirable that more detailed Information be collected concerning the effects of floods and low waters and their prevention by engineering works and other devices.

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The annual soil wash in mainland United States is estimated at about 1,000,000,000 tons, of which the greater part is the most valuable portion of the soil; it is carried into the rivers, where it pollutes the waters, necessitates frequent and costly dredging, and reduces the efficiency of works designed to facilitate navigation and afford protection from floods.

Both the regimen of streams and the purity and clarity of waters are affected by forests and other natural growth, and by farming, mining, and other industrial operations over the watersheds in which they gather. Millions of acres in mainland United States have been deforested unnecessarily, and the floods and low waters ascribed to this cause have in some localities occasioned losses commensurate with the value of the timber. Means should be devised and applied for coordinating forestry, farming, mining, and related industries with the uses of streams for commerce and for other purposes.

The effect of wide variations in the fevel of navigable streams is to render difficult the establishment of necessary terminals for the handling of traffic, and thus to interfere seriously with the utilization of our inland waterways. The prevention or mitigation of such variations would be most helpful to the revival of river traffic, and means to this end should be adopted in plans for waterway improvement.

In the acquisition and needless destruction of forests, whose preservation is a public necessity for stream control, for timber supply, and for other purposes.

National platforms are, generally speaking, the crystallization of public sentiment as it exists at the time of the convention. Last summer both of the great national parties held conventions, and both referred to the question under consideration to-day. The Republican platform referred to this subject as follows:

We indorse the movement inaugurated by the administration for the conservation of natural resources, we approve all measures to prevent the waste of timber, we commend the work now going on for the reclamation of arid lands, and reaffirm the Republican policy of free distribution of the available areas of the public domain to the landless settler. No obligation of the future is more insistent, and none will result in greater blessings to posterity.

The Democratic platform, adopted July 10, 1908, referred to natural resources in the following phraseology:

We repeat the demand for internal development and for the conservation of our natural resources contained in previous platforms, the enforcement of which Mr. Roosevelt has vainly sought from a reluctant party; and to that end we insist upon the preservation, protection, and replacement of needed forests, the preservation of the public domain for home seekers, the protection of the natural resources in timber, coal, iron, and oil against monopolistic control, the development of our waterways for navigation and other useful purposes

WHAT OTHER NATIONS ARE DOING.

We are not in an advanced position in forestry; in fact, we have neglected this resource and have done very little compared with what is being accomplished by other nations. Practically every first-class country has already a well-developed forest policy. Some of them date back many years; in a few cases several centuries. Not only have the great nations of the earth forest reserves which they are protecting and making profitableat least twelve countries obtaining at this time a net revenue from their forest holdings-but several countries have commenced to purchase lands, not only for the purpose of conserving water flow, but to prevent erosion and to get the benefit of the natural increment which their experience justifies them in expecting.

Austria, between 1885 and 1898, purchased 350,000 acres of forest lands. Up to 1902 Switzerland had expended $500,000 in 74965-8090

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purchasing forests. France has expended five millions in purchasing 400,000 acres of forest lands, and the French have arranged for expenditures which in the end will aggregate forty millions to complete their present scheme of purchase and reforestation. In their reforestation work, up to this time, onethird of the cost has been for land.

In the last thirty years Sweden has purchased 600,000 acres, at an average cost of $5.30 per acre. Most of this purchase has been waste land, and has been made for the purpose of reforestation. And it should be noted that Sweden is one of the greatest exporters of forest products among the nations of the world.

Since 1860 Norway has systematically purchased forest lands. Recently it has appropriated from fifteen to twenty thousand annually for this purpose. Most of these lands are cut-over lands, which are protected by the Government or reforested, as necessities may develop.

Great Britain, which has the smallest percentage of its territory in forests, as compared with other countries of the world, has recently had a special commission examining the desirability of developing for forestry areas of land not useful for agricultural purposes, the result of this being a report by this commission recommending the purchase and forestation of 9,000,000 acres. The commission develops a complete scheme for carrying out this work, proposing that 150,000 acres a year for sixty years shall be afforested, at an annual cost which will begin at $450,000 and increase to fifteen millions at the end of the period. The commission estimates that after the fortieth year the forests will be self-supporting, and when the project is completed that they will have a value of more than $500,000,000 in excess of the cost of producing them and will yield a net annual revenue of nearly $10 per acre from land which is now producing less than 50 cents per acre." There are other reasons, however, which influenced the commission to recommend this project, among them the fact that it will furnish employment for a large number of people and that it will not bring the country into competition with any private industry.

In order to show, in figures, what other nations are doing, I append to this address a statement showing the acreage of forests, the character of the ownership, the cost and results of cultivation, and so forth.

This report has been received with every evidence of approval by all classes and has the nearly unanimous indorsement of the press, so that there is every reason to expect its adoption.

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ITALY.

In almost every country where forestry has been exploited the forests are divided into two classes: Protective forests-that is, forests around the headwaters of streams and on steep mountain slopes; and available forests-that is, forests which are developed for the financial results obtained. This is the case in Italy, where a general forestry law was passed in 1877. This law rigidly protects certain portions of the forests on the higher parts of the mountains, but where it is debatable whether the land should be forested or devoted to agriculture the law is very liberal, the purpose being to protect the steeper mountains from landslides, to protect the headwaters of streams, and to use that area which is not valuable for other purposes in developing forests. This law, however, has not been sufficient to prevent destruction of certain forests on lands which were not useful for agriculture, therefore producing, by the removal of the woods, an area of unproductive land. A recent commission appointed in Italy recommends that at least 500,000 acres should be replanted at once, at a cost of not less than twelve millions, to prevent destructive torrents brought on by destroying timber on the hillsides. Complaint had been made in Italy that it was too expensive to enforce her forest laws, but the result has been that it has been determined that it is more expensive to leave them unenforced.

RUSSIA.

The devastation of the forest and its evil consequences on water flow and soil conditions has been especially felt in the southern districts adjoining the steppes, and these experiences were the immediate cause of the enactment of the forest law which governs all European Russia. This law establishes as protective forests, to be managed under special plans prescribed by the forest department, those which protect the slopes of mountains, where they serve to prevent erosion, landslides, and avalanches.

M. Lokhtine, in discussing forest and water conditions in central Russia at the International Congress of Navigation, held at Milan in 1905, said:

The cases of the suppression of water mills are frequent and sudden in Russia, where they form an important industry. Having myself a mill of this sort on my own property, and being interested in the industry, I gathered data in our neighborhood, situated in the Kazan Government, celebrated formerly for its forests of oaks and lindens. I counted on the tributaries of the Sviyaga as many as 70 mills which used to be there in the past and constantly at work. Less than half now remain, and even they run with only half the stones and lie idle for a certain time during the summer for lack of water. These little rivers become converted into impetuous torrents in the spring and break the dams with such violence that many millers gave up wrestling with this element let loose, which brought them only loss. They abandoned their mills entirely, the ruins of which, still standing, may serve as the answer in fact to the question of the consequences of the destruction of forests on rivers.

FRANCE.

France has not quite 18 per cent of forest-three-fifths of an acre per capita. This is enough to produce only one-third of the home demand. The country imports annually $30,000,000 worth of wood, and pays $6,000,000 duty and $10,000,000 freight for it. Of the 23,500,000 acres of French forests, the state owns 74965-8090