173 



Let us next for a moment consider the duties and opportunities of Canada in this 

 great question of National Economy, which, whether we are willing or not, will unavoid- 

 ably and only too soon be pressed upon our notice. The crown lands here belong to the 

 Pi'ovincial Governments, excepting in Manitoba and the North Western Territories, in 

 which they are owned by the Dominion Government. 



This plan of management differs somewhat in its details, but in the main is this : — 

 The forest is leased, generally at a certain ground rent per square mile, and for short 

 periods, and a certain rate of tax is collected upon the timber that is taken out. If two 

 lumbermen want the same tract it is put up at auction, and the man who pays the most 

 for the privilege, in addition to the ground rent and the rate tax, obtains it ; but gener- 

 ally the man who has made improvements, and has complied with the terms of his lease, 

 is allowed to renew it from year to year until the timber is all removed. The soil itself 

 is retained by the Government, and after a lapse of time it may again come into market 

 for the sale of another crop. 



"VVe may congratulate the Canadians in having already, and, perhaps, inadvertently 

 made a long advance in the way of forest management, which, with amendment, may 

 gradually be brought into a very complete system. In the Province of Quebec the pine 

 trees under twelve inches in diameter are reserved from cutting. It would be better 

 to rescue them of larger size, because a pine of that size is gaining more rapidly than at 

 any other period, and it is a sacrifice of interest to cut it of that size. 



This is good as far as it goes ; let me suggest some further regulations tending to 

 profitable returns and to future supplies. Let the wood-lands where the timber has been 

 cut be carefully protected against fires, against pasturage, and against plunder. It would 

 require a system of forest wardens, or guards, and would require some outlay, but the 

 investment would, in the end, prove profitable in the result. 



Let there be introduced at first, in your agricultural schools and your colleges, in- 

 struction in Sylviculture ; and at the first, and till something better could be provided, 

 let eaqh graduating class have the opportunity of hearing at least a few lectures upon the 

 first principles of forest management and of tree planting — and the profits that result 

 from judicious planting upon private estates. 



With a proper study of the methods by which the public timber lands should be 

 managed, I am convinced that a judicious and practical system could be devised for 

 bringing these lands up to the standard of greatest possible production, and that it could 

 be sustained for a long period of time. 



But aside from this management of public woodlands by the Government, there are 

 other, and vastly greater objects to be attained, in the way of planting, by the owners of 

 land. We have already noticed the fact that throughout all the older States of the 

 American Union, and in most of the settled portions of the newer States and the Terri- 

 tories, as well as in the settled portions of Canada, the title to the lands has been passed 

 to private owners, without reservation as to their cultivation or their clearing, and that 

 neither a general nor a local government can interfere in their management, so long as 

 they do no injury to the public. 



It is these owners of lands that must do all the planting ever done upon them — at 

 least from our present stand-point we can foresee no prospect that any such improvement 

 would be undertaken at the public cost, or by compulsion of law. 



But men do not incur expenses unless they can expect returns, either in advanced 

 values, or in saleable products, and they must be made to realize that money is to be 

 gained or saved, before they will be willing to incur expense. 



It is the main business of Forestry to teach how this can best be done in tree plant- 

 ing, in places best suited for their growth, it implies a knowledge of the climatic condi- 

 tions, of the capabilities of the soil, the requirements of particular species, and the best 

 methods of management. 



In undertaking this cultivation, it is of the first importance that we shoiild under- 

 stand, not only the limits of possible endurance, but especially those within which we 

 may secure .tlie most favorable growth. In a region that was covered with timber when 

 its settlement began, we have generally an evidence of what might be secured by plant- 



