PERIODICAIv LITERATURE 335 



tions had been excessive, but thinks even here the cutting has been too 

 severe and the procedure "robbery." 



The communal forests of Alsace are mostly in timber forest, while 

 those in Lorraine are coppice with standards, of which the "Prussian 

 Oberforster had not heard before" and certainly will not have im- 

 proved them. 



The production of all forests in Alsace-Lorraine was estimated in 

 1900, in the absence of definite data for private and communal forest. 

 at 52 cubic feet timberwood, of which 45.8 per cent was workwood. 

 The exact statistics of the State forests for the first 25 years of Ger- 

 man occupancy show an output of almost 60 cubic feet, with a work- 

 wood per cent of 70 and a sawlog per cent of t,t,, which later rose to 

 45 and 48. 



The money returns from 1872 to 1893 varied between $3 and $4.30 

 gross per acre and year; in 1908, it had passed the $5 mark, of which 

 57 per cent for expenses (in 1910 48 per cent), and shortly before the 

 war this represented 11 per cent of the total State revenue of the two 

 provinces as against 3.9 per cent for Prussia and 9.5 per cent for 

 Bavaria, and hardly 7 per mille for the French State forests. The aver- 

 age price for wood came in 1908 to nearly 9 cents per cubic foot. 



The author complains of the generous salary list and general extrava- 

 gance of the administration at the expense of the provinces ; the per- 

 sonnel in 1908 took 29.1 per cent of all expenses as against 15 and 18 

 per cent for the Bavarian and Prussian services. 



In the final section of the article the author gives advice how to 

 reorganize the forest administration of the returned provinces. It is 

 interesting to note that most of the administrative changes made by 

 the Germans are thought to be acceptable. In this connection we trans- 

 late verbatim the interesting characterization which Huffel gives of his 

 compatriots and their peculiar democracy : 



"Order and clearness are eminenth' characteristic qualities of the French 

 spirit. The passion for uniformity, the centralization to the utmost are deformi- 

 ties of these beautiful qualities. The forceful hand of Richelieu and of Colbert, 

 and that still mightier and more t3Tannical one of Napoleon, have made of our 

 dear France the most centralized, the most uniformed, the most autocratically 

 governed country in the world." 



The author deplores this and constructs an administration in sem- 

 blance of the Prussian democratic one, in which the supervisor has the 

 management really in his hand. 



The clearing and planting of conifers, to be sure, is anathema and 

 must be abolished ! 



Les Forets de V Alsace-Lorraine. Revue des Eaux et Forets, December, 1918, 

 pp. 265-280. 



