"I don't say it will be good
for immediate returns, nor even for returns in the near future, but
in twenty or thirty years it ought to pay big on a small investment
made now."
Taylor shook his head doubtfully.
"I don't see how you figure it," he objected. "We have more timber
than we can use in the East. Why should we go several thousand
miles west for the same thing?"
"When our timber gives out, then we'll HAVE to go west," said Orde.
Taylor laughed.
"Laugh all you please," rejoined Orde, "but I tell you Michigan and
Wisconsin pine is doomed. Twenty or thirty years from now there
won't be any white pine for sale."
"Nonsense!" objected Taylor. "You're talking wild. We haven't even
begun on the upper peninsula. After that there's Minnesota. And I
haven't observed that we're quite out of timber on the river, or the
Muskegon, or the Saginaw, or the Grand, or the Cheboygan--why, Great
Scott! man, our children's children's children may be thinking of
investing in California timber, but that's about soon enough."
"All tight," said Orde quietly. "Well, what do you think of Indiana
as a good field for timber investment?"
"Indiana!" cried Taylor, amazed. "Why, there's no timber there;
it's a prairie.
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