•The THE MACMILLAN COMPANY SAN FRANCISCO MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. TORONTO OF NATURAL RESOURCES IN THE UNITED STATES BY CHARLES RICHARD VAN HISE MADISON, WISCONSIN ILLUSTRATED New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1912 All rights reserved PREFACE THIS book contains the substance of twenty lectures given at the University of Wisconsin. The lectures have been revised, but the general form in which they were given is retained. Many papers have been published in the government reports and in the various magazines upon special phases of the conservation of the natural resources of the United States; but no correlated statement covering the minerals, waters, forests, soils, their relations, and the relations of the subject as a whole to humanity, is available. It therefore seemed advisable to put into a handbook of moderate size the essential information which an intelligent citizen might desire in reference to conservation. It is somewhat presumptuous for any one man to speak concerning fields which are so widely different from one another as are the minerals, waters, forests, and soils, and especially to speak of the relations of these subjects to political economy, and to law, existing and desirable; yet it is necessary, in order that there shall be unity of treatment, that the attempt be made by some one. Since no man can possibly be familiar with the facts of all these branches of knowledge, it is almost certain that occasional errors will have crept in; but there has been very earnest effort to verify so far as possible every statement of fact, and thus reduce such errors to a minimum. It is certain that the specialist in any of the fields covered will be dissatisfied with the treatment of that field; but in order to cover the entire subject of conservation in a book of moderate size it is necessary to abbreviate; not only so, but to omit many ramifications of the subject which it would be interesting and profitable to follow. Doubtless, in the near future, there will be separate books on conservation for each of the divisions of the subject; and in such books there will |