COMMITTEES ON BEHALF OF THE GOVERNMENT 319 
forest corps. This part of the program was not regarded by 
the committee, or at least by some of its members, as of primary 
importance. Stress was, however, laid on the desirability of 
offering relatively high rates of compensation and providing 
for retirement, in order to attract men of integrity who would 
render intelligent and conscientious service. 
To provide for the proper establishment of new forest re- 
serves, the committee recommended that a board of forest 
lands should be created, composed of an officer of the Engineer 
Corps of the Army, an officer of the Geological Survey, an 
officer of the Coast Survey and two persons not connected with 
the Government service, whose duty should be to fix the boun- 
daries of such reserves. 
These and other recommendations were summarized by the 
committee in its report which closes as follows: *™ 
“1. That the Secretary of War, upon the request of the Secretary of the 
Interior, shall be authorized and directed to make the necessary details of troops 
to protect the forests, timber, and undergrowth on the public reservations, and in 
the national parks not otherwise protected under existing laws, until a perma- 
nent forest bureau in the Department of the Interior has been authorized and 
thoroughly organized. (See bill No. 1.) 
“2. That the Secretary of the Interior shall be authorized and directed to issue 
the necessary rules and regulations for the protection, growth, and improvement 
of the forests on the forest reserves of the United States; for the sale from them of 
timber, firewood, and fencing of actual settlers on and adjacent to such reserves, 
and to the owners of mines legally located in them for use in such mines; for 
allowing actual settlers who have no timber on their own claims to take from the 
reserves firewood, posts, poles, and fencing material necessary for their immediate 
personal use; for allowing the public to enter and cross the reserves; for granting 
to county commissioners rights of way for wagon roads in and across the reserves; 
for granting rights of way for irrigating ditches, flumes, and pipes, and for 
reservoir sites; and for permitting prospectors to enter the reserves in search of 
valuable minerals; for opening the reserves to the location of mining claims under 
the general mineral laws; and for allowing the owners of unperfected claims or 
patents, and the land-grant railroads with lands located in the reserves, to 
exchange them under equitable conditions for unreserved lands. (See bill No. 2, 
secs. 2-4.) 
*? Rep. Nat. Acad. Sci. for 1897, pp. 64, 65. 
