in Provence and the Cevennes. 339 



unfortunately, it has spread mucli before the men get to it, 

 there is nothing to be done but to light counter fires, which 

 is a very diflBcult operation if they are required to burn up 

 wind. The arrangements made by M. Muterse are admir- 

 able in every way, and might well serve as a model of how 

 such things should be done in India. Until we came to 

 the Maures and Esterel, we had no idea that forest 

 fires were such a serious question in any part of France, 

 or that such complete arrangements existed for their 

 suppression. The system of petits feux is the same as 

 that previously explained; but it may be here added that 

 the law provides that the Prefect shall fix a period in each 

 year during which the lighting or carrying of fire within or 

 near the forests is prohibited; here the period is that from 

 June to September inclusive. The "small fires" must 

 not be lighted during those months, and there must be fire- 

 lines of a fixed minimum breadth, cleared of all pines and 

 brushwood, round every forest so treated. In case of the 

 fire spreading from one property to another during the 

 progress of these operations, or otherwise, the owner of the 

 forest into which the fire has spread can, in case of proved 

 carelessness or non-compliance with the regulations, claim 

 damages against the proprietor of that in which it origin- 

 ated; and on this account the burning is conducted with 

 great care, the ground being watched for fully thirty hours 

 afterwards, in order to make sure that pieces of smouldering 

 wood do not cause the fire to break out again. 



The forest is stocked with cork oak mixed with 

 cluster pine, the latter being, as was noticed in the 

 Maures, in too large a proportion ; and the efforts of the 

 local forest officers are now directed to the establishment 

 of a mixture such as will tend to promote the greatest 

 possible yield of cork, which is, or at any rate will be, the 

 paying crop. There is self-sown cluster pine everywhere, 

 the seed, which has a large wing, being blown to long 

 distances; and after the ground has been burnt over, a dense 

 crop of pine seedlings comes up, with oak coppice mixed 

 among it in a greater or less proportion. The pines are 

 then cut back, so as to allow the young oaks to grow ; and 

 forests of the latter species, mixed with a due proportion of 

 pine, are now being raised in this manner ; but in some 



