298 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



of the value of even the little preventive means used in this state. 

 No sensible man pretends that human agency can extinguish a 

 great forest fire. The object of the fire warden law is to prevent 

 such fires from starting or, if, unfortunately, they have started, to 

 extinguish them before they become unmanageable. Prevention is 

 the main feature of the fire warden law, as is seen in the impor- 

 tance attached to posting and publishing warning notices. Thus 

 far the state has expended, under this law, less than $5,000 a year, in- 

 cluding the one-third of county expenses which it pays; and the ex- 

 pense of the thirty odd counties affected by the law has averaged 

 less than $100 a year. 



FOREST FIRES IN 1898. 



Reports from fire wardens, made to the Chief Fire Warden, of for- 

 est fires in 1898, show that there were 51 such fires, which burned 

 over 21,580 acres, much of which was light timber or cvit-over lands. 

 Total damage reported, $9,063, which seems very small and is ac- 

 counted for in part by some of the damaged timber being cut the 

 succeeding winter. Seventy-eight per cent of the whole number of 

 fires reported were extinguished or controlled by fire wardens or 

 their helpers. A man in Todd county was made to pay a fine of $100 

 and costs for carelessly causing a fire which spread half mile into 

 a neighbor's field, where it fatally burned a woman and severely 

 injured a boy who tried to protect '.her. There were several other 

 vigorous and effective prosecutions. 



PRAIRIE FIRES. 



The number of acres reported as burned over by prairie fires was 

 54,360; damage, $13,436. The number of such fires caused by burning 

 grass, straw or stubble was 23; by railroad locomotives 14, other 

 causes 5, unknown 25. 



DEMONSTRATION FOREST. 



The report, which contains numerous illustrations of the Minne- 

 sota forests, describes some of the timber country in Beltrami and 

 Cass counties, which was visited in the month of August. A partic- 

 ular description is given of a splendid pine forest on the south 

 shoreof Cass lake, recently made accessible by railway;also of some 

 very fine forest on the north shore of Vermillion lake belonging to 

 the State University, and which the Chief Fire Warden advocates 

 being set apart as a demonstration forest for the use of the school of 

 forestry connected with the Agriculture College and Experiment 

 Station. If this were done, he thinks the State University of Minne- 

 sota would outrank all other universities, except Cornell, in this 

 country in the important science of forestry, which is so rapidly 

 coming to the front. The Chief Fire Warden visited the Itasca State 

 Park and points out the need of roads and paths therein. 



EUROPEAN FORESTRY. 



In proportion as people are informed in regard to forestry will 

 they be disposed to use precautions against the ravages of forest 



