DUE PROPORTION OF WOODLAND. 303 
In countries with a humid sky, or moderately undulating sur- 
face and an equable temperature, a small extent of forest, 
enough to serve as a mechanical screen against the action of 
the wind in localities where such protection is needed, suflices. 
But most of the territory occupied by civilized man is exposed, 
by the character of its surface and its climate, to a physical 
degradation which cannot be averted except by devoting a large 
amount of soil to the growth of the woods. 
From an economical point of view, the question of the due 
proportion of forest is not less complicated or less important 
than in its purely physical aspects. Of all the raw materials 
which nature supplies for elaboration by human art, wood is 
undoubtedly the most useful, and at the same time the most 
indispensable to social progress.* 
The demand for wood, and of course the quantity of forest 
required to furnish it, depend upon the supply of fuel from 
other sources, such as peat and coal, upon the extent to which 
stone, brick, or metal can advantageously be substituted for 
wood in building, upon the development of arts and industries 
employing wood and other forest products as materials, and 
* In an imaginary dialogue in the Recepte Véritable, the author, Palissy, 
having expressed his indignation at the folly of men in destroying the woods, 
his interlocutor defends the policy of fellmg them, by citing the example of 
“* divers bishops, cardinals, priors, abbots, monkeries and chapters, which, by 
cutting their woods, have made three profits,” the sale of the timber, the rent 
of the ground, and the ‘“ good portion” they received of the grain grown by 
the peasants upon it. To this argument Palissy replies: ‘‘I cannot enough 
detest this thing, and I call it not an error, but a curse and a calamity to ail 
France; for when forests shall be cut, all arts shall cease, and they which 
practise them shall be driven out to eat grass with Nebuchadnezzar and the 
beasts of the field. Ihave divers times thought to set down in writing the 
arts which shall perish when there shall be no more wood; but when I had 
written down a great number, I did perceive that there could be no end of my 
writing, and having diligently considered, I found there was not any which 
could be followed without wood.” . . ‘And truly I could well allege to 
thee a thousand reasons, but "tis so cheap a philosophy, that the very chamber- 
wenches, if they do but think, may see that without wood, it is not possible 
fo exercise any manner of human art or cunning.”— Guwvres de BERNARD 
PALIssy. Paris, 1844, p. 89. 
