LETTERS FROM OUR YOUNG FRIENDS.


We have received two very interesting letters, one from E.J.K., 461 West
43d Street, and one from C.H.K., 504 West 44th Street. We thank these
friends for their kind letters, but are unable to print them at length.

_To the Editor._

DEAR SIR:--In your article in No. 51, on the forest fires
and drought following a very wet season, and remarking that
we should have such extremes, is it not due--our
irregularity of climate--to our careless devastating of
whole portions of the country of trees? Many claim so. We
are in sore need of national or state foresters. [Signed]
INQUIRER.


DEAR INQUIRER:

While vegetation has something to do with the climate, the sudden
changes to which we are subject are due to the configuration of the
land. The Rocky Mountains and the Appalachian Range rising at either
edge of the continent form the immense valley through which the
Mississippi takes its course; and these two factors of the high
mountains and the broad plains have the greatest influence on the
climate.