Dance of the Trees

Richard St. Bark Raker’s work as a forester, tree-planter, and founder of the Society of The Men of the Trees is known in every country in the world. The first The Men of the Trees were the Kikuyu of Kenya where the author spent seven years as a Conservator of Forests. As a boy St. Bathe Baker learned forestry in Hampshire. As a youth he served an apprenticeship on the North West Frontier where he hunted with Cree Indians who taught him to ‘live on the forests’. He has planted trees in Australia, New Zealand and Palestine: his fight for the preservation of the majestic Redwoods of the United States of America made history. In 1953, he led an expedition into the Sahara that discovered traces of lost forests and lakes beneath the sands. ‘Dance of the Trees’ is the story of a ceaseless struggle to defend nature from the encroaching desert. If forests are not conserved, the author declares, the world will become a desert. Already he is preparing a project called The Sahara Reclamation Scheme which might make fertile a desert greater in area than Australia. In the Great War Richard St. Bathe Baker served as a soldier, and in the last war as a mounted policeman. He lives strenuously, dangerously and happily; his story; is enriched by his memories of famous people and great.