Arizona citizen., 1878-12-07
TIMBER LANDS AGAIN
Secretary Schurz and Commissioner Mi
 Gam's Annual Reports Thereon.

Land Office, in letter written officially
 to me, expresses the following opinion
 of the Act relating to Colorado, NeYa- da and the Territories.
 It is fact we'll known that while
 almost all the timber land in those
 States and all the Territories, except
 Dakota and Washington, is regarded
 as mineral, only small portion is so
 in reality. The effect of this bill will.
 in my opinion, be to prevent the sur
 yey end sale of any timber lands or
 timber upon lands in the States and
 Territories named, thus cutting otflarge
 prospective revenues that might and
 should be derived from the sale of
 such lands or the timber upon them.
 It is equivalent to a donation of all the
 timber lands to the inhabitants of those
 States anl Territories, which will be
 found to be the largest donation of the
 public domain hitherto made by Con-
 gress. This bill authorizes Registers
 ana Receivers of Land Offices in dls
 tricts in which the lands are situated
 to make investigations, without any specific directions from the Secretary of the Interior or the Commissioner of
 the General Land Office, to settle and adjust their own accounts, and tO retain from moneys coming into their
 hands arising from the sales of lands such amounts as they may expend orI cause 10 be expended. This method
 will be found exceedingly expensive,
 and result in no good. Experienced
 has shown that the machinery of theI
 Land Offices is wholly inadequate toI
 prevent depredations."
 Schurz continues: "The rules and regulations issued in pursuance of the first section of this Act are to be found in the report of the Commis
 sioner of the General Land Office. here
 with presented. These ruIes-drawn up with view !O and an intention of preserving young timber and under. growth upon the mineral lands of the United States, and to the end that the. mountain sides may not be lett denuded and barren of the timber and under growth necessary to prevent the preci- pitatiOn Of rainfall and melting snows in floods upon fertile, arabic lands in the valleys below, thus destroying the agricultural and pasturage interests of the mineral and mountainous portions Of the cOuntry-make it the duty of the Registers and Receivers to see that. upon timber lands not min eral be reported; that upon mineral lands only, timber only of certain size be cut, and that young trees and be protected, and that timber be cut only for the purposes in the Act These rules and regulations will be enforced with all the power left to this Department to thIs end, in order 10 save what may be saved. But deem it my duty tO call attention to the fact, as set forth by the Commissioner in the letter above quoted that the machinery of the Offices is utterly inadequate to ac- complish the object in view. Af.er a careful consideration of the above. named Act and probable effects, l venture the prediction that the permis- sion given to inhabitants of the States and Territories named therein 10 take timber from the public lands, in any quantity and wherever they can find It, for all purposes except export and sale to railroads, will be taken ad vantage of not only by settlers and miners tO provide economically for their actual current wants, but by per sons who see in this donation a chance to make money quickly; that it will stimulate wasteful consumption beyond actual need, and lead to wantOn des- tructlOn; that the machinery left to this Department to prevent and re- press such waste and destruction through the enforcement of the rules above mentioned, will prove entirely that as the final result, in l few years the mountain sides of these States and Territories will be stripped bare of the timber now growing upon ! them, with no possibility of its repro 2 1uction; that said timber being Oncel wasted of from the slopes, irreparableI destruction of the forests will bring upon those States all the calamities ex- Derienced from the same cause in dis .ricts in Europe and Asia similarly si- uated. It appears 10 me, that the re- f peal of the above named Act, and the thereof of law embody- ing a more prOvident policy, similar .o that hereinbefore advocated, is in he highest degree desirable If the i, destruction of the forests in these States { be permitted, the agricultural interests a n the mountainous regions will in ' evilably be sacrificed, and the valleys. will, in the course of time, become un- it for The habitat!On of men. a
 TIE Steamship Pommeriana, Cap [ ain SchwenseD, which left New York November l4ih, for Hamburg, and ar t lived at Plymouth at midnight on tbe | 'iih, was sunk by collision with a Welsh bark of FolkestOne next night The lalesI news says 94 of the crew Of. III were saved, and = passengers out Jf l0J