DISCUSSION ON FORESTRY ADMINISTRATION AND EDUCATION. 7 



our own people, but last year farm products to the value of 

 ^165,000,000 were exported.' After glancing at the great 

 increase in personnel of the Department, Mr Wilson dealt with 

 the different branches of the Department, pointing to the 

 development and achievements of each 'in the interests of the 

 farmer.' Several straggling divisions had been brought under 

 a 'Plant Industry' branch; there were the Soil Survey branch, 

 Land Drainage branch (in both of which the Agricultural and 

 Forest branches worked together), Animal Industry branch, 

 Economic Entomology branch, Weather Bureau branch, and 

 the Forestry branch. Mr Wilson did not place the forestry 

 branch last. I have done so for convenience. ' The work in 

 forestry,' said the Secretary, ' which has grown to a position 

 of such recognised importance, may be said to be the product of 

 the past eight years. At the beginning of the period the branch 

 employed eleven persons, six filling clerical appointments. With 

 the offer by the Department of Agriculture of practical assistance 

 to forest owners in the management of their tracts, the field 

 of action shifted from the desk to the woods.' And with this 

 action and the energy with which Mr Roosevelt, the President, 

 preached the forestry cause, the growth of public opinion on 

 the importance of the subject was rapid. I have read these 

 extracts to you because they point conclusively to the fact 

 that far from forestry being divorced from agriculture in 

 America it is closely and intimately connected with it. It 

 forms one of the branches collected under the Secretary of 

 Agriculture. 



"At the period of which I am speaking Lord Curzon was 

 Viceroy of India. India had a forestry branch under the 

 Secretary of the Revenue and Agricultural Department. But 

 no specialised agricultural branch existed. The want of such 

 a branch was felt probably as much by the forestry branch as 

 by any other since, in its absence, it proved next to impossible 

 for forest officers to get into touch with agriculture, a good 

 deal of unnecessary friction, avoidable under other conditions, 

 being the result. It was Lord Curzon who put his finger on 

 this weak spot, one of the numerous instances in which that 

 great viceroy exhibited his unerring judgment. He formed 

 the specialised agricultural branch under the Secretary of the 

 Department of Agriculture, and in his speeches during the 

 period of his viceroyalty he bore witness to the intimate 



