Technics of Forestry. 



By J. CHARLES KING. 



No. I. 



The unlettered craft of the workman, as soon as it finds a written 

 or verbal exposition, becomes at once the technics of his toil. In most 

 crafts the processes are manual and so simple, and the tools few and 

 familiar, that their diversity or similarity are capable of explanation 

 in a brief essay. 



The coinage of the word technic will, in future a,i>es, mark as 

 an index point the period of the recognition of the value and dignity 

 of toil. 



A modern poet has paid tribute verse to the idea : — 



" He marks au epoch, who on scroll unfurled 



Dares grave men's thoughts, or by his voice proclaim : 

 He flings his mandates to a listening world 



That tribute pays by faith, by time, by fame." — " The Eph: of a iJnyy 



In remarking on the technics of forestry it would seem that there 

 is but little to say about the handling of an " axe," a " bill," or a 

 " saw," or " winding a withe," " girdling a tree," or " planting a shoot," 

 " grafting," &c. ; and for that very reason it should be said, for the advan- 

 tage of the young forester, and also for the man of science, who is 

 often stopped short in his exposition of science by his ignorance of the 

 technics of toil, sometimes descending to guesswork to elaborate his 

 views or theories, too often wrongly, as our encyclopaedias show in their 

 descriptions of the processes and methods of workmen. 



Before explaining the processes and methods adopted by woodwards 

 in forest work, and illustrating their tools and their uses, it may be 

 well to define at once the boundaries between art, science, and technics, 

 which is, perhaps, best done by showing the relation they bear to 

 each other. 



Technics are the manual or muscular operations, or methodical pro- 

 cedures, by which workmen do things. 



Science is demonstrated knowledge based on unvarying principles 

 in nature, or modes of operation having recognised adoption for esti- 

 mating and determining results. 



Art is the skilful application of things or processes to each other 

 by the rules of science, by which added pleasure is given to the 

 senses. 



