236 ANNUAL REPORT. 



THE STUDY OF FOBESTEY AS AN IMPOETAKT 

 CONTRIBUTOR TO PRACTICAL EDUCATION. 



[Read at the St. Paul meeting of the American Forestry Congress, August 

 8, 1883, and copy kindly furnished by the author.] 



By Hon. H. G. Jolt, op Quebec, Canada. 



There is a danger, in treating this subject, that of exaggeration 

 which will damage the best cause. 



The fact that we have met here from such widely distant sections 

 of North America, that many of us, leaving our homes and occupa- 

 tions, have traveled hundreds and hundreds of miles, to attend this 

 Forestry Congress, is a strong guarantee that every effort made to 

 raise in public estimation, the study and practice of Forestry, will 

 meet with your hearty support; but I wish to appeal to your reason, 

 rather than to your sympathy, and to satisfy the judgment of the 

 thoughtful men who are ready and willing to join every earnest 

 effort if they can once see that its results will be beneficial to 

 mankind. 



What is meant hy j) radical education? Training the child, his 

 body, his mind and his heart for the work of life. It is a general 

 preparation for it. When you begin the education of the child, you 

 do not know what his future occupation in life will be. A good edu- 

 cation is like a solid foundation, built on the rock, ready to receive 

 and support, with safety, any kind of superstructure that may be 

 erected upon it. 



Education is Training. There is mental gymnastic to train the 

 mind, as well as corporal gymnastic to train the body. A man is 

 not often called upon in after life, to repeat the performances 

 learnt, as a boy, at the gymnasium; he may even forget them, for 

 want of practice, but he will preserve through life some of the 

 strength and activity thereby acquired. 



The aim of practical education or training ought to be as much 

 as possible, to choose for the training of children such exercises as 

 will be directly applicable and useful in after life, and I think the 

 study of forestry fulfills these conditions, to a great degree. 



Timber is in request more or less, all over the world. The 

 Esquimaux is about the only man who dispenses with it, not from 



