254 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



This is not a technical but a valuable propagandist article with 

 some professional flavor in so far as it combats natural regeneration 

 and argues preference for planting in the recovery of the cut-over 

 forests of the Commonwealth. The reasoning is quite convincing, 

 the usual arguments of the two schools of artificial and natural refor- 

 estation being presented with special reference to the physical con- 

 dition of the forests to be recuperated. 



As the article was prepared by a member of the State Forestry 

 Reservation Commission, we had hoped to find more definite statistical 

 information df conditions, but, besides a very general description, we 

 find only a general estimate of the probable forest soil area as around 

 12,000,000 acres, somewhat less than' 44 per cent of the total 

 land area, 300,000 acres of which are set down as still virgin forest, 

 and 70 per cent, say 9,000,000 acres, so devoid of uninjured trees 

 of valuable species that it must be planted. And now, with the 

 chestnut blight threatening the extinction o*f that most important 

 species in Pennsylvania, still further acres are added of this descrip- 

 tion. 



Mr. Elliott comes to the entirely sane position, that the recuper- 

 ation must be by planting; that the State principally has to be relied 

 upon to carry on this work, with possibly municipalities assisted, and 

 private planters tax-assisted ; but that the enormous burden should 

 not be lightly undertaken ; and, especially, that the State should not 

 make any further purchases until an adequate work of recovery on 

 the existing State lands has been done. 



The State so far has spent in purchase and organization $4,625,000, 

 and the Department of Forestry annually spends $300,000. A bond 

 issue is suggested and the profitableness of the venture is asserted, 

 largely on the basis of German experience and without attempt at 

 figuring it. B. E. F. 



The Essentials of American Timber Lazv. By J. P. Kinney. 

 Wiley & Sons, New York. 1917. Pp. 279 +x, 8°. 



In organizing the curricula of two forest schools, the reviewer 

 insisted that a forester, presumably destined to become a manager of 

 property and business, should possess a knowledge of the essentials 

 of business law in order to be able to interpret statutes and business 



