14 TRANSACTIONS OF EOVAL SCOTTISH AKBOKICULTUEAL SOCIETY. 



the Conservator, to whom it is their duty to submit proposals on 

 all subjects relative to the management and working of their forests. 

 Authority in certain matters is delegated to them, but they are not 

 permitted to exceed their ordinary powers, except in cases of emer- 

 gency. The division is subdivided into beats, each in charge of a 

 forest guard. There are 1272 of such beats, their average size 

 being 4^ square miles. 



Forests which come under the provisions of section 17 of the 

 law, but are not the property of the State, are managed under the 

 authority of the administrative committees of the sixty-four depai-t- 

 ments and fourteen free towns into which Hungary is divided ; 

 and each of these acts through a sub-committee of three members, 

 chosen either from its own body or among other persons skilled in 

 forest business. The State exercises control over the actions of 

 these committees by means of inspectors, of whom there are twenty 

 in Hungary, each having two or more entire departments assigned 

 to him. The committee has power to decide, in accordance always 

 with the provisions of the forest law, all questions that are from 

 time to time submitted to it by the communes or other proprietors ; 

 but it is compelled to take the advice of the inspector, subject to 

 an appeal by them or by him in case of disagreement to the 

 Minister of Agriculture. In urgent cases, the inspector, as the 

 minister's representative, has power to stop fellings or other opera- 

 tions which he considers detrimental to the forests ; and in such 

 cases the administrative authorities and local police are bound to 

 support him. In case the committee habitually fails in its duty, 

 the minister can replace it by a State commissioner ; and this has 

 once been done. The twenty inspectors, with their twenty assist- 

 ants and offices, cost the State ^£8932 in 18S4, and £9360 in 1885. 

 The supervision exercised according to law by these officers is not at 

 present liked by the proprietors, especially by those among them 

 who desire to enrich themselves at the ex^^ense of future genera- 

 tions ; but the good advice they have received has added many 

 thousands of pounds to the value of their forest capital. Experience 

 continues to show the necessity for the maintenance of the existing 

 system ; and the inspectors are now called upon to redouble their 

 efforts in order to safeguard the public interests, and to correct the 

 errors of the past. 



The State will take charge of, and manage through its own 

 officers on behalf of the owners, the conmuinal forests in any 

 department the administrative committee of which applies for this 



