Mar., 19oo. ~ .',~/~'.~" ezJl(/ ('oJ/IHZejlA~. 225 N()'I'I¢S \m~) COMMENTS. A N.\TI()N.\I, I'ARI.Z 1N 'FIt]:; ]~AS'I'.
The creati(m of a ~reat national forestry and game reserve ill northern 3Iiunesota, embraci,ng 7,,,,~c~,,~, acres around the headwaters of the .Mississippi River, with many lak~..s elf rare beauty, well stocked with fish, is being aetively ;~dvocated iu Co~gre~s t) 5 ' prominent citizens of Chicago and Nimlesota. Thepromotets of the plan are not likelyl.o experience much difficulty ill interestil~ C,:,:~gress. The game and the virgin forests of the l.hfiied States are disappearing so rapidly, that it is exceedingly important that iilea~ures lie taken, beh,'e it is; too late, to save some of the great wooded are ~s of the cc-ltinent.
It is one ol" tile m'trked f~.atures of the legislative and popular indifference to th<dr best i.terests c<)1)1111,,I1 Io those regions that such enterprises as this llevcr originate in our S(,utbcrt~ States. Vet there, it would seem, we have the most promising, most .~td:q)table and most accessible regions for such purposes to be found .'luy\vl'.cre within our national limits. Nearly all of the forestry reserves that have been established up to the present tilne are in the far Northwest; the elfief of them, the Yellowstone National Park, ixinaccessible to the great majority of the people. Nothing of national scope is to be found east of the Mississippi River.
\Vithin about a day's travel of New York, Philadelptfia, Baltimore, Washington and most of the A~lant!c seaboard, and quite as accessible to Pittsburgh, Cincimlati, Louisville, Indianapolis and St. Louis, there are vast stretches of virgin forests--along the line of the Great Smoky Mountains, on file border between Temlessee and North Carolina--that are thorougtfiy suited to the purposes of a great game and forest preserve. Going up from the lowlands at Walhalla, S. C., to the high plateau surrounding Highlands, N. C., a stage trip of about 3o miles, the late Professor Gray, the eminent tlotanist of Ilarvard, tells us that he encotmtered a greater number of species of indigelwus trees than could be observed in a trip from Turkey to England, 'through F.urope, or from the Atlantic coast to the Rocky Mountain plateau. Tile region surrounding that described by Professor Gray, especially to the x~est, with the headwaters of the Temmssee, the French Broad and tile Sarannull Rivers, all within a few miles of eaeh other, with fertile valleys and mountain elevations of 5,ooo feet or more, and a density of verdure unapproaehed elsewhere, is an ideal spot for a preserve, where every sort of North American animal or fish would thrive and where almost every tree or plant found within our borders from the Atlantic to the Pacific would grow uncured for. The land in this region is still purchasable " for a song," certainly at as little as or even less than that obtaining in the Northwest. The climate, while sufficiently severe in tile winter to suit the more northern species of animal life, is never sufficiently so to kill great quantities of game, either by freezing or through lack of winter food, as is not uncommon in the Northwest woods.
Added to the climatic and the varied physical characteristics of this region,