The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-12-07

the black scale, the worst pest of the orange and lemon industry in Cali fornia.
 Careful preliminary work is being done towards producing our own silk. The mulberry is being distributed in large numbers, eggs are being imported and distributed, improved reels were imported from Europe last year, and two expert reelers were brought to Washington to reel the crop of cocoons and teach the art to our own people. f The crop-repOrting system of the Department Of Agriculture is being brought closer to accuracy every year. It has two hundred and fifty thousand reporters selected from people in eight vacations in life. It has arrangements with most European countries for in- ter-change of estimates, so that our people may know as nearly as possible with what they must compete.
 Irrigation.
 During the two and a half years that have elapsed since the passage of the reclamation act rapid progress has been made in the surveys and examine tions of the opportunities for reclama- tion in the thirteen States and three Territories of the arid West. Con- struction has already been begun on the largest and most important of irriga- tion works, and plans are being com .pleted for work which will utilize the funds now available. The operations are being carried on by the Reclamation Service, a corps of engineers selectd through competitive civil-service ex- aminations. This corps includes experi- enced consulting and constructing en- gineers as well as various experts in mechanical and legal matters, and is composed largely of men who have spent most of their lives in practical affairs connected with irrigation. The larger problems have been solved and it now remains to execute with care, economy and thoroughness the work which has been laid out. All impor- tant details are being carefully consid- cred by boards of consulting engineers, selected for their thorough knowledge and practical experience. Each project is taken up on the ground by compe tent men and viewed from the stand- point of the creation of prosperous homes, and of promptly refunding to the treasury the cost of construction. The reclamation act has been found to be remarkably complete and effective, and so broad in it's provisions that a wide range of undertakings has been possible under it. At the same time, economy is guaranteed by the fact that the funds must ultimately be returned to be used over again.
 Forests.
 It is the cardinal principle of the for. est-reserve policy of this administra- tion that the reserves are for use. Whatever interferes with the use of theirTesources is to be avoided by every possible means. But these resources must be used in such way as to make them permanent.
 The forest policy of the government is just now a subject of vivid public in terest throughout the west and to the people of the United States in general. The forest reserves themselves are of extreme value to the present as well as to the future welfare of all the western publie-land states They powerfully affect the use and disposal of the pub, lie lands They are of special impor- tance because they preserve the water. supply and the supply of timber for do- mestic purposes, and so promote settle ment under the reclamation act. 1n-. deed, they are essential to the welfare of every one of the great interests of the west.
 Forest reserves are created for two principal purposes. The first is to pre- serve the water supply. This is their most important use The principal users of water thus preserved are irrigation ranchers and settlers, cities and towns to whom their municipal water sup- plies are of the very first importance, users and furnishers of water power, and the users of water for domestic, manufacturing, mining, and other pur- poses. All these are directly dependent upon the forest reserves.
 The second reason for which forest reserves are created is to- preserve the timber supply for various classes of wood users. Among the more irnpor- tant of these are settlers under the re- clamation act and other acts, for whom a cheap and accessible supply of tim Der for domestic uses is absolutely necessary; miners and prospectors, who are in serious danger of losing their timber supply by fire or through export by lumber companies when tim Der lands adjacent to their mines pass into private ownership; lumbermen, transportation companies, builders, and commercial interests in general.
 Although the wisdom of creating forest reserves is nearly every where heartily recognized, yet in a few locali- ties there has been misunderstanding and complaint The following statement is therefore desirable:
 The forest-reserve policy can be suc- cessful only when it has the full supp port of the people of the West. It can not safely, and should not in any case, be imposed upon them against their will. But neither can we accept the views of those whose only interest in the forestAi is temporary; who are anx- ious to reap what they have not sown and then move away, leaving desola- tion behind them. On the contrary, 1t Is everywhere and always the interest of the permanent business man, the man with stake in the country, which must be. considered and which must deside.s s&
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