“Sure,” said Charley.

“Would you call the forest there destroyed?”

“If it isn’t, I don’t know how you would describe it,” said Lew.

“All right, then.  There are some 45,000 square miles in this state.  Originally practically all of that area was dense forests.  The early settlers thought the timber would last forever and they cut and destroyed it recklessly.  The lumbermen that followed were just as wasteful.  It was all right to clear the land that was good for farming.  But there are more than 20,000 square miles in this state just like these mountains—­land that is fit for nothing but the production of timber.  None of that land is producing as much timber as it should.  Much of it yields very little.  And more than 6,400 square miles are absolutely desert, as bare and hideous as the burned valley below us.  That’s one acre in every seven in Pennsylvania.  Think of it!  Six thousand, four hundred square miles, an area larger than the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island put together, that is absolute desert!  Every foot of that land ought to be producing timber for us.  Then we should have lumber at a fraction of its present cost.  You see the freight charges alone on the lumber used in this state are enormous.”

“That lumber dealer told us they amounted to $25,000,000 a year,” replied Lew.

“They do,” assented the stranger.  “And when the new freight rates go into effect the amount will be $40,000,000.  What it will be when we get our wood from the Pacific coast I have no idea, but I suppose it will be at least double what it is now, anyway.”

“The Pacific coast!” cried Lew.  “Why should we get lumber from the Pacific coast when we can get it from the South?  The lumber dealer told us that practically all the wood we use now conies from the South.”

“He was right.  But we shall presently be getting our lumber from the far West for the same reason that we now get it from the South.  In ten or a dozen years there won’t be any lumber left in the South for us to buy.  They will do well to supply themselves.  Then we must bring our lumber from Idaho and Oregon and Washington and California.  The freight charges will be something terrific, and the wood itself will cost a good deal more than it now does because it will be so scarce.”

“Great Caesar!” cried Lew.  “What will a poor devil do then if he wants to build a boat?”

“Or if he wants to build a house?” suggested the stranger.  “You know lots of folks have to build houses every year.  Look at all the people who get married and build homes.  Why, when I was a little boy, you could buy the finest kind of lumber for ten or fifteen dollars a thousand.  It didn’t cost much then to build a house.  Now a man has to work for years before he can save enough to pay for a home, even a very modest one.  And what it will cost when the wood from the South and the far West is all gone I hate to imagine.”