80 FOREST commissioner's REPORT. 



to return to forests. This policy will help restore the productive 

 forest area and not lessen the acreage in farms. 



There is a tendency throughout the State to better culture and 

 greater productiveness on a given area. Statistics show a gradual 

 increase in the size and number of farms and the value of farming 

 lands. 



Statistics tell us that the products of the farm bring a higher 

 price in Maine than in any state east of the Pacific slope, also that 

 in production of grains, roots, grass and fruits, our soil will com- 

 pete well with other states. 



In consideration of the above facts we cannot subscribe to the 

 gloomy idea entertained by many, that Maine competes at so great 

 a disadvantage in agricultural pursuit with her sister states. Farm- 

 ers in Maine have more comfortable homes and seem more prosperous 

 than in the West and South. 



We believe that agriculture should bear a certain relation to other 

 industries so as not to result in over production. The reason farm 

 products now bring such a good price is the demand for them for 

 home consumption, and our remoteness from other competing sources 

 of supply. 



The waning of our forests will bury agriculture and the lumber 

 industry in a common grave. One is the life of the other. The 

 inauguration of a wise forestry policy would not only help restore a 

 declining industry to its former prominence and give a larger product 

 as a perpetual supply from a smaller area, but would permit more 

 of our acreage to become productive farms without destroying the 

 equilibrium. 



If our agriculture shows any waning tendency, it is not attributa- 

 ble to our climate or to the sterility of our soil, but to the devastation 

 of our forests and the decline of the lumber industry decreasing the 

 demand for farm products. 



LUMBER INDUSTRY WANING. 



That the lumber industry is waning in Maine can be shown by a 

 study of lumber operations on the Penobscot. In 1856, the cut was 

 about 180 million feet; in 1860, 201 million feet; in 1866, 237 rail- 

 lion feet, and in 1872, it reached its maximum at 246 million feet. 

 Since that date it has never reached the cut of 1856. It has fluct- 

 uated very much since. In 1877, it fell to 117 million feet. Since 



