1228 JAMES LAWLER 



Conditions during the French regime. 



The country was taken for the king of France by Jacques Cartier 

 in 1534, but it was over a century' later before anything began to be 

 heard about the timber as an asset. The first timber regulations, as appears 

 from a grant of land made in 1683, were made in regard to the reservation 

 of oak to build the King's ships. The remainder of the timber was of no 

 consequence. In fact, as the first need of the colonists was food, the en- 

 deavour was to get cultivated land upon which crops might be raised, and the 

 forest was deemed an enemy to be conquered and obliterated. During 

 the French regime the timber was not considered apart from the land. 

 The colony was divided up into large blocks of land, from 100 to 500 square 

 miles in extent, which were granted to seigniors or feudal lords upon con- 

 ditions involving the settlement of these lands with tenants or retainers, 

 commonly called " habitants ". who held whatever rights the}^ had, not from 

 the Crown but from the seignior, under feudal tenure. 



Timber formed such a negligible part of the commerce of that day that 

 the only question considered was its apportionment among the different 

 parties to these land grants, the Crown, the seignior and the "habitant". 



The determination of the pioneer settlers to get rid of the trees which 

 encumbered their lands and their use of fire for this purpose was later felt 

 in the shortage of timber for fuel in the immediate neighbotirhood of centres 

 of population, so that by 1720 stringent laws were passed against trespass- 

 ing by the inhabitants of towns and villages on the lands of their neigh- 

 bours to cut fuel. 



New regulations with British occupation. 



When the British took possession of New France in 1763 their solici- 

 tude, like that of the French, was to secure timber for the building and re- 

 pairing of the royal navy — oak {Quercus alba, or Q. rubra) for hulls and pine 

 {Pinus strobus or P. resinosa) for masts. But their views went a step fur- 

 ther than those of their predecessors. They desired not only to secure 

 existing stands of oak and pine, but also deemed it advisable that any areas 

 particularly suited to the growing of these species should be .set apart and 

 protected, so that they might supply timber in perpetuit3^ The instruc- 

 tions of the British Government to the first Governor, James Murray, are 

 clear on this point and these in.structions were repeated when Governor 

 Guy Carleton took up his duties in 1775. 



If this policy had been followed, and non-agricultural lands reserved 

 for timber as settlement advanced into the country, the whole history of 

 timber regulations and the development of the timber industry in Canada 

 would have been changed and Canada would have been better off in regard 

 to both agricultural and forest develo]iment, but this was not to be. Such 

 a policy of examination, segregation and conservation was over a century 

 in advance of the time. Nor, regrettable as was this falling away from an 



