American Foresters Poorly Trained. 375 



is well prepared; the man who obtains his first degree for liter- 

 ature, history, economics and philosophy has no preparation and 

 the class can go no faster than these poorest prepared men are 

 able to go. In either case the work is strictly undergraduate and 

 necessarily of a low order to meet the necessities of the poorly 

 prepared. 



The four year undergraduate school gives a uniform and more 

 thorough course. The work is more consecutive, and the longer 

 time gives more chance for the practical application of the prin- 

 ciples learned to existing conditions, more time for the signifi- 

 cance of the theories taught to sink in. The graduate from such 

 a course is a better trained man, but is lacking in general educa- 

 tion, which the forester of all men should have. A course on top 

 of this degree would be real graduate work and would give 

 splendid results, but such a thing is out of the question till some 

 opportunity offers a proper reward for such training. 



The fragmentary courses given at so many schools in the 

 country serve a good purpose. They are centers of education for 

 the enlightening of the laymen. They instill a leaven which will 

 lighten the whole loaf of public opinion wonderfully, but they 

 should not be considered as professional schools. Some men are 

 being graduated from these schools who have never seen a forest. 

 The education obtained in all of them is necessarily one-sided. 



The complete undergraduate school gives a bachelor's degree 

 for a four years' course, the graduate school gives a master's de- 

 gree for a two year course of the same work; the fragmentary 

 course often yields a degree which sounds as well as either. Who 

 shall say what the standard shall be? 



The civil service examinations are largely responsible for this 

 state of affairs. Nine-tenths of the men graduated from the 

 forest schools go into the forest service, and there is nothing for 

 the schools to do but live up to the standard of those examina- 

 tions. A man with two or three years experience as a lumber 

 jack stands quite as much show of passing these examinations as 

 the well trained technical forester and a great deal more show of 

 rapid advancement when he is in. 



Many of the high places in the Forest Service to-day are held 

 by men of little or no technical training. What show has the 

 technical man under such conditions? It is the same old question 

 of the grammar school man belittling the college graduate, and 



