This was a great mistake, as the people now know. The white pine of the North gave a soft white wood that could be easily carved or “turned,” and it was used more extensively than any other wood as long as the forests lasted. A large part of the South is still covered by forests of yellow pine, whose wood is dark, hard, and valuable for building purposes. The pine forests of the South also yield large quantities of tar, resin, and turpentine, and it is sad to see the forests being carelessly destroyed each year. The trees are cut for their sap, from which turpentine and other products are made, but if the same trees are cut three years in succession they die. The turpentine makers, however, cut them as long as they will yield sap, because it is easier to stay in one place three years than to move their camps to a region of fresh trees. This is wrong, and will result in destroying the valuable Southern pine forests in a short time. We should take care of the trees, for they are our good friends. Besides providing wood for all sorts of uses, they protect the earth, keep it moist, and prevent the streams from drying up. In many places the farming land has been destroyed, because the forests were cut down when the land all about dried up, so that nothing of value to man could grow on it. With proper management trees can be cut for use without destroying the forests. [Illustration] SEEDS THAT FLY WITHOUT WINGS OR PLUMES. Poppy seeds have no wings and no plumes, and yet they are carried far and wide by the wind. That is because they are so very small and so very light. They look more like dust than seeds. [Illustration: Poppy pod.] The poppy pod is like a cup with a cover on, but around the edge, just below the cover, is a row of small holes, each covered by a lid. These lids do not open until the poppy seeds are ripe; then they do, and the fine seeds can get out of the holes. But _how_ do they get out? They cannot move of themselves, but the wind sways the poppy pod this way and that on its long stalk, and the little seeds are shaken out only to be caught by the wind and blown away. Perhaps you think that is not a very sure way for the seeds to escape, but if you examine a poppy head that has been ripe for some time you will find scarcely a seed in it, so it proves to be a better way than it looks. Nature’s way is generally the best way to accomplish an object. Poppies are often seen growing by the roadside or in the garden, far from the flower beds; that is because the wind has blown the seeds to these places. In England the wheat fields are often gay with scarlet poppies, which have, no doubt, been sown with the wheat. They are beautiful to look at, though the farmer does not enjoy seeing them in his wheat. Opium is obtained from the juice of the partly ripened seed pods of some kinds of poppies. Opium is very valuable as a medicine, but it has to be used with great care, as it is also a powerful poison. [Illustration]