Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1895-11-15
IT WAS ONCE A PRAIRIE.
Only in Recent Years Have North
Cardinals Forests Sprung Up.

liz 1olio" III s NAl1Sl II o-AA ''1A
address o. Gen. S. D. Adkins, of
Freeport, H., will be of interest
to this State:
81 often thought that if the
prairie fires had been kept down,
eventually all the vast prairies of
Illinois would be covered with |
timber growth. When | was a
boy l saw in geography d pics
tire of buffalo in North Caro-
lima prairie. There are no
prairies in North Carolina now;
but in the spring of 1865 l lay in
camp at Concord, Cabarrus
county, in that State, and one
day was invited to dinner some
miles in the country by General
Means. After dinner we went
Que on the porch to enjoy our
cigars, with General Means,
pointing to pretty view down
he valley, said: 4 think you
zyill not find 50 beautiful a view
e., that in Illinois, Ireplied that
5tanding Oh the highest point of
tie quarter section constituting
ny fathers farm | could see a
.opher running anywhere on
ne farm, when the prairie grass
vas burn d i'll the spring, and i'll
u, directions broad prairie for
niles and miles. The father of
{ neral Means, a very old man,
ting in a rocking chair, got up
18th difficulty and walked to the
aiIing Of the porch, and, putt
ting one hand on it and pointing
With the other trembling hand
Town the valley, said: when l
cttled here, a young man, and
quilt that little log house, as far
IS the eye could see was a smooth
prairie.' | was in doubt about
his memory, but the next day l
rode with some members OF my
staff through the timber for
miles and could find no very
large trees, nor large stump,
and | was convinced that | had
talked with a man who had seen
a smooth prairie,
"In timber counties, when the
.imber is cut off and the land
broken up and then abandoned,
It will be covered by all entirely
different timber growth. When
ord CORVALLIS, commanding
II English army, passed through
Orange county, North Carolina,
.uring the revolutionary war, he
ut military road through the
wilderness, and | have tracted it
or miles over high and rocky
ground that had never been Cu1-I
tivated, by the growth Of pine in
the old military road. 1t is sur~
prising how soon nature will
cover a piece Of abandoned land
with a luxuriant growth of tim
Der. Camping with my brigade
a few miles south Of Savannah,
Ga, i'll a heavy pine forest, and
for the cleanliness Of the camps
we cleared away the covering of
pine needles and cones and
swept the ground with Brush
brooms, when we found that our
camp was once cultivated
rice field and the rice rows were
as plainly marked as the burrows
IN one of your fields OH your
prairie farms.
"\NhO knows but that one
day, long before America was
discovered, these broad prairies
We're covered with timber? Some
years ago, OH a prairie near
l]recport, in digging a we'll, al
large log, well preserved, looks
ing like the redwood of Califor-
MIA, was found 40 feet below the
surface. Who lived here when
those trees were growing where
he prairies are now? Who was
il who lived here when the So
cIled Indian mounds found all
a,ong the valley of the Pecato-
MICA We're built? Not the Indian.
Another race of men, of which
history preserves no record, was
here thousands Of years before
any of the oldest of old settlers of
Winnebago county first saw this
goodly land.
"Not many years ago 1 went to
the mouth of the Mississippi