New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1892-07-17
TIE APPALACRTAN FORESTS.

II is commonly thought that the only forests
worthy of preservation in the United States
rs educational exhibits OF the resources of
Nature are in the Far West Travellers who
have made their way across the mountains on
horseback from Ashcvillc, in Western North
Carolina, into Eastern Tennessee are well aware
that there are forest tracts there more varied
and interesting if possibly less majestic, than
the Sequoia and Redwood forests of California.
On the slopes of the Big Smoky and adjacent
ranges are TO be seen in perfection all the
characteristic trees OF the Northern and South
ern States. The magnoias of Florida are re-
vealcd there in their most luxuriant habit. The
birchcs, naples, pines and spruces there are
giants of Brobdingnag compared with the
dwarfs of Northern Liliput. The grandest
oaks, hemlOcks, walnuts, cheStnuts, hckories,
ashes and lindens to be found within the wide
compass of the Appalachian system are to be
seen there The central situation of the for
est region combined with an altitude ranging
downward from level of 5000 feet above
the sea has erected an intermediate zone of
vegetation where the growth of magnificent
trees has been favored 1t is a forest temple
where columnar trunks blossom into foliated
capitals hundreds of feet overhead, and where
everything in material, color and proportion
is, as in Solomons Temple, perfect of its kind.
The question has been raised by " Garden
and Forest" whether it is not well worth while
to preserve for all time some blocks Of this
Appalachian forest with its giant decduous
trees. The necessity for legislative interven-
ton is disclosed in letter which it publishes
from wcll-informed correspondent who has
been visiting Roam Mountain. In the valley
of the Doe River where twenty years ago was
an unbroken forest of unrivallcd splendor and
variety he has counted twenty saw-mlls and
dozen tanneries along the line of n narrow
gauge railroad. The black walnuts. the cherries,
the young poplarS, the white oaks and the hem
locks have already been cut down; and it will
not be long before the chestnutS and remain
ing big trees follow them. The same process
OF destruction is rapidly extending to the less
accessible valleys of the Big Smoky range.
Lumber must be had for great market, and
spectators who are purchasing one forest tract
after another and planning railways for faci-
tatng their work are not incumbered with
sentiment respecting trees. The destruction of
this grand primeval forest is only question
of time Unless some measures are taken to
reserve some portions of these glorious woods
of the Southern Alleghanies the next genera
ton will not have any opportunity of knowing
what Nature could do when at her best in ac-
complshing her miracles of forest growth
We most heartily second the proposal Of
Garden and Forest" that National reserya-
ton shall be created either among the Big
Smoky Mountains or in one of the central
ranges connecting them with the Blue Ridge.
The present Congress has not distinguished
itself by enacting legislation of marked utility
or of high educational order 1t would do
something to redeem its reputation if it were
to appoint a commission of forestry experts to
investigate this subject and to devise means
for securing by purchase and maintaining as