he growing exports of nitrate from Chili at present, amount to
about 1,200,000 tons annually.'

"In carefully analyzing this lesson from the lips of Professor Crookes,
we discover that the same peculiar climatic conditions which made a
Chilian desert so valuable, have been continuously at work in our great
American desert for a great many thousands of years.

"For this reason, our uncounted acres of alkali lands, are so rich with
stores of this valuable nitrogenous compound, that by proper treatment
they may become the most valuable wheat-producing lands in the world.
The desert shall become the source of abundance! Under the transforming
influence of a generous water supply, forests shall spring up, and
fields of waving grain shall flourish around the village homes of a
happy, prosperous people! Altogether, we have an empire of these
irrigable lands now worthless, awaiting the transforming labor of the
homeless and landless, to restore them to productive fertility.

"When thus restored, these lands, at the lowest estimate, will be worth
the enormous sum of two billion, eight hundred and eighty million
dollars, which in due time may be transferred to the credit side of the
wealth account of the nation! Long before this available domain of such
vast possibilities has been conquered and reclaimed, the longing desires
of all who wish for land, and for agricultural lives, for themselves and
their children, will have been most abundantly satisfied.

"In looking over this broad field of possibilities spread so temptingly
before us, we are able to discover the importance of the work of
tree-planting, which now demands our attention. Strengthened by
concerted action, encouraged by new ideas and better methods we become
firm in our convictions, that it is an imperative duty for us to
continue the good work. We must increase the number of our co-operative
farms with their tree-planting schools, until, educated and moved by the
force of so many demonstrations, a great majority of the people of this
Republic shall demand, that the entire area of the range of the Rocky
Mountains within our geographical limits, shall become a permanent,
public park; with such a wealth of territory and variety of climate,
such beauty of scenic grandeur and magnitude of picturesque proportions,
as the world never saw before. This matchless reservation is to be
devoted to the needs and uses of forestry, mining, the preservation of
its great variety o