“In France, whole communities were ruined by the denudation of their lands; and obliged the government to enter upon the work of restocking this ruined section of country with young trees at a cost of many millions of dollars; all to regain what had been lost through indifference. But how is it now? The region of the Landes, which fifty years ago was the abandoned country of little value, inhabited by a few sickly shepherds, who wandered over the country with their meager flocks, is now the most prosperous part of France. It has been made so by the planting of forests, and has now saw-mills, charcoal kilns, turpentine works, thriving towns, and fertile agricultural lands, and a growing and increasing valuation, and the net gain to the government by the expenditure amounts to over two hundred million dollars. “Not until the sheltering influence of trees has disappeared, the climate made variable with sharp and sudden changes of temperature, successions of thaws and freezings; not until springs and brooks become dry in summer, and a failure of all kinds of crops and plants, does the improvident ask or even wonder what the matter is. “_Every reserve of timber in this country ought to be sacredly guarded by the government_, and timber cutting be put under stringent regulations, looking to the continued protection of the streams. _Unless this is done the Mississippi river will surely change its character._ It will become a shallow, sluggish stream, unable to carry off impurities, and useless for navigation or water-power. It will not take very long to effect this change, if the forests are destroyed in the northern part of its source. A present gain in lumber will mean very great injury to all other material interests.”[22] A special from St. Paul says--“From Rainy Lake to the Lake of the Woods, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, the entire country is covered with a heavy growth of timber and is mostly pine, and is totally uninhabited save by scattering bands of Chippewa Indians. That these two great lakes are connected by Rainy Lake river, one of the finest navigable streams in North America; and on which its branches and the Lake of the Woods, no less than twenty steamers and tugs ply from early spring to late in the fall, conveying stolen timber from the United States to Rat Portage, Keewatin, and even to Winnipeg, where it is manufactured and sent wherever a market can be found.