330 Forestry Quarterly 



applications are in a country where conditions are so different 

 from those of North America. 



In the first place, it must be understood that the Bureau of 

 Forestry under the American regime began with almost a clean 

 slate. The Spaniards had done very little in exploring or devel- 

 oping the immense dipterocarp forests, confining their attention 

 principally to the scattered trees of the finest cabinet and most 

 durable construction woods; their literature on the subject was 

 scanty and, for the most part, extremely unscientific ; the botany 

 of the Islands was in a condition only to be described as chaotic; 

 and finally, practically nothing existed in the way of collections 

 of either herbarium material or wood specimens. If any such 

 had existed (and it is to be supposed that the Spanish Forestry 

 Bureau must have had something in the way of a working col- 

 lection of herbarium and wood specimens), they were probably 

 lost in the fire which totally destroyed their offices in Manila, just 

 a year previous to the American occupation. From all this it will 

 be seen that the task of the Bureau of Forestry was almost like 

 that of exploring an entirely new country. Only by actual ex- 

 ploration and collecting could any knowledge be acquired at all. 



Now for the application of the knowledge so gained. First, 

 there was the very pertinent and practical matter of collecting 

 the forest revenue. Once the system of classifying the woods into 

 various groups was adopted, it was necessary to learn to know 

 the trees and their products, in order to carry out properly the 

 law regarding the collection of the forest charges. And here, at 

 the very beginning, entered a difficulty not mentioned before. 

 It is well known how many different popular names a given 

 species may have in different parts of the United States. If this 

 is the case where all the people speak one language, imagine the 

 condition in a country where they speak a different dialect or 

 language in every province, or even in adjacent towns! A con:- 

 plete dictionary of PhiHppine plant names (if it is ever written!) 

 will be about the size of Webster's Unabridged. Is it necessary to 

 explain the need of being able to recognize the timber in order to 

 tell to what group it belongs ? 



Probably half the inquiries that come to the Bureau of For- 

 estry regarding classification, qualities, uses, etc., of timber, origi- 

 nate in this matter of the variety of local names and in a majority 

 of cases they can only be answered positively if the inquirer sends 



