REVIEWS 929 



ancy between commercial practice and these tests is very probably due 

 to the use of wood containing an average moisture content varying 

 from 2 to 1 1 per cent. vSuch thorough seasoning cannot ordinarily be 

 obtained in commercial practice, es])ecially when "artificial" seasoning 

 methods are employed. 



B. L. G. 



Report of the Forest Braiieh of the Department of Lauds, Province 

 of British Colninbia, for the Year Ending December ?/, iQiy. Vic- 

 toria, B. C. 1 918. Pp. 26. 



This report from first to last consists of tables and diagrams. It 

 starts out, without prefatory remarks, with a set of tables and diagrams 

 showing the returns of the timber industry in British Columbia. Minor 

 materials being translated into board measure, the cut for 19 17 comes 

 out precisely to the same figure as that for 1916, namely, 1,161,750,000, 

 but the value is nearly 40 per cent larger, with $48,300,469. Of this 

 around $44,000,000 is exported, Australia and the United Kingdom 

 taking the bulk, with about 90 per cent. A diagram, placing the exports 

 from Pacific ports for the last five years in comparison, shows in gen- 

 eral a decline of exports, but for British Columbia an increase to Aus- 

 tralia, China, and Africa. Diagrams, giving oiUput by districts and 

 species, show X'ancouver as to district and Douglas fir as to species to 

 far outdistance all others, only cedar coming into closer competition. 



Timber sales were made at the remarkably low average price of 99 

 cents per thousand board feet, Douglas fir bringing $1.12. The total 

 reveiuie collected from the forest amounted to $2,338,333, or 16 per 

 cent over the preceding year and bringing it back to the amount collected 

 in 1914, but remaining considerably Ix'hind i<;i3. when it aniounled to 

 nearly $3,000,000. 



The expenditures wore round $229,000, besides $140,000 contribu- 

 tion to the forest protection fund, a similar amount being contributed 

 by the licensees. .\ statement dating back to 19 12 shows expenditures 

 for fire protection in some years rumiing over $400,000, and for nine 

 months in 191 7 to over $200,000. There are ncnv 13,()63 licensees 

 almost half of them in arrears. .X relief act ])asse(l in H)i/ allows such 

 lapse for only one year of grace, and it is expected that soon the number 

 of dead licenses will be known, whicii hitherto was impossible, as many 

 had to be considered rcinstatable. Crown-grant or private timber lands 

 amount to almost one million acres, valued or assessed at $<).6i per acre, 

 the best district numing uj) to Si 8.31. 



