Smyrna times., 1876-09-13
The Destruction Of Forests.

We are again suffering from what threat
ems to become an annual visitation. With
a temperature of only $50 during the noon
day hours, the air is as dead and oppressive
as during the extreme heats of July; the
streets and shores seem to smolder under
vail Of dull blue haze; the sky is partiality
obscured but. gives birth to no rain bring
ing cloud, and an unaccountable lassitude
and depression are felt by all who are sem
sitive to atmospheric influences. From the
west and northwest, over the intervening
hills and lowlands, the smokes of burning
forests drift down upon us, sitting portion
of the ozone which remains to us after the
Summer drouth, and rendering our atmos-
phere impure and suffocating. The extent
to which such conflagrations spread their
influence is not generally appreciated.
Sometimes a large forest-fro in Southern
New Jersey will for days obscure the air Of
all Pennsylvania east of the Alleghenies
The smoke Of the great Chicago fire of 1871
reached the Atlantic coast in about GO hours,
still carrying with it the strong smell of
burned grain and goods. The burning of
the woods in Canada is felt on the shores
of Chesapeake Bay.
This periodic recurrence of forest-fires is
made possible by tho prolonged spells of
dry weather which have followed the wan
ton destruction Of so much of our native
woodland. 1t matters little practically,
therefore, whether the former arc acciden-
tai or the work of incendiaries: the original
cause remains the same. The shrinkage of
rivers and streams has become universally
apparent; and equally SO is the increase of
great floods and foundations, whereby
Nature violently restores the equilibrium.
The proportion of ferest to cultivated land,
which is necessary in ordor to preserve the
normal rainfall, is now tolerably we'll set
tied; and the fact that, in many parts Of
the country, that proportion has already
been violated, has long been evident
While we have an annual season of drouth,
we are sure to have an annual burning of
forests. No system of guards or corps of
organized fire-fghtcrs will be 80 cffectual
to prevent the latter as the simple prevcn-
ton Of the former. In Europe the Gov
ernments have long ago recognized tho
subject as one Of common interest to the
whole population, and have taken the
forests under their protection. TO this
complexion we shall also probably be forced
to come at last.
The power of forests to attract the pre-
cipitation of moisture, we may add, is mod
ificd-and to much greater extent than
is generally supposedly the character of
the trees. The experiments which have
been made in France show that the rainfall
, is much more abundant, and the springs
and streams much larger, in regions where
forests are of deciduous trees, than where
, they are evergreen. Some observers even
assert that spring will dry up if grove
of cOniferous trees be planted around it.
We notice, in this country, that the pine
) will flourish in a very dry, sandy soil; but
we have not considered whether the pine
may not be partly responsible for the dry
, ness. In Virginia, and parts of the other
older States, the native forests of oak,
t hickory, and other deciduous trees arc
> succeeded by spontaneous growth of pine
If the latter be not actually drouth-crea-
ting, it is certainly far more inhammable,
1 and the prevention of a change in the
character of our forests may be no unim-
portant step. We can only, at present
! suggest the subject to our readers. It's vast
t importance, and the immense necessity OF
I some form of action, need no discussion
n N. Y. Tribune.