FORESTRY IN FRANCE. 233 
thus satisfies their requirements, which are chiefly in fuel and small- 
sized timber, much better than forest managed under the latter 
system. But even in cases where the conversion of communal 
coppice to high-forest is deemed advisable, it is always found diffi- 
cult to reduce the annual fellings to the quantity necessary in order 
to allow the growing stuck to accumulate to the required extent ; 
while the small size of the greater part of these forests renders them 
unsuited to the treatment which they would have to undergo in 
order to effect their conversion. The coppice system, including 
coppice under standards, is therefore in vogue in almost all com- 
munal broad-leaved forests, such high-forest as the communes pos- 
sess being found chiefly in mountainous regions, and being composed 
of coniferous trees, which will not coppice. The area of communal 
forest shown as under conversion consists principally of tracts in 
which the coniferous trees are spontaneously taking possession of 
the ground, and driving out the broad-leaved species. It follows 
from what has been said above that the State alone can, generally 
speaking, raise broad-leaved high-forest on a large scale, or under- 
take the conversion of coppice to high-forest. 
A further difference between the systems of culture generally 
adopted for the State and the communal forests may be noted, viz., 
that whereas in the former less than one-fifth of the high-forest is 
treated by the selection method, three-fourths of the communal 
forests are so treated. In mountainous regions, where, as has just 
been said, the greater part of the communal high-forest is found, the 
selection method possesses incontestable advantages, in consequence 
of the continuous cover which it affords to the soil; but although 
the respective merits of the two methods, as applied to coniferous 
forests situated in such regions, are much disputed at present, there 
has of late years been an undoubted tendency to return to selection, 
which has for some time past fallen into discredit, and, taking the 
State and communal forests together, somewhat more than one-half 
of the total area of their high-forest is now treated in this manner. 
Two variations of simple coppice are sometimes practised : (First) 
That known in the Ardennes as sartage, in which, after the wood 
has been cut and removed, the twigs and chips are burnt on the 
ground, in order that their ashes may give to the soil sufficient 
manure to permit of the growth of a crop of cereals during the year 
immediately following the cutting. This system, which, as carried 
out in France, seems to be practised rather for the sake of obtain- 
ing the crop of corn than as a method of forest culture, is gradually 
