CONTINENTAL NOTES — GERMANY. 20? 



These provisions may be regarded as sufficient and satisfactory, 

 but a grave danger threatens the efficient re-afforestation of 

 private forests, especially in Prussia, where Stein's Reform Bill, 

 passed in the height of enthusiasm immediately after the close 

 of the Napoleonic wars, left almost entire freedom of action in 

 this respect to private proprietors. 



It is now an everyday occurrence that the purchase of estates 

 is engineered by timber-trading firms, who enter the property 

 simultaneously with the new owner and clear the land of all 

 saleable wood; then, means being scarce, the disforested areas 

 are frequently left for years, without adequate recultivation, at 

 the mercy of sun and wind. Another and perhaps even more 

 serious danger is brought about by the breaking up of estates 

 for the formation of small holdings. The problem as to what is 

 to be the fate of the forest area under such schemes, which other- 

 wise meet with general approval, is a most serious one Their 

 division with the rest of the land would be a continuation of the 

 mistake made in the case of former communal settlements and 

 partitions, and would again lead to the creation of entirely 

 unmanageable bits or strips of forest land. Any direct State 

 interference is, in the face of Stein's reform laws, out of the 

 question. This being recognised, a beginning has been made 

 of late years with the formation of associations, or, as it were, 

 private trusts, composed of the landed proprietors themselves, 

 with the addition of professional foresters, in order to influence 

 the regulation and management of private forest property. 



In the provinces of Pomerania, Brandenburg, and Posen con- 

 siderable progress has been made in this direction, and regular 

 working-plans have been framed and settled for 342,000 acres. 

 The scheme has not as yet made much progress in other 

 provinces, because the peasant proprietors argue that, as a rule, 

 they follow, in respect of their communal forests, the regulations 

 periodically framed in consultation with the local forest officers, 

 and they object to any additional interference. A distinct 

 movement exists and is growing, favouring the reconstitution 

 of communal forests, which were partitioned under settlements, 

 and this may pave the way towards a sensible solution of the 

 problem of the treatment of forest areas included in estates to 

 be broken up into small holdings. 



The great land and forest owners, possessing a considerable 

 part of the private forests of the country, have their own forest 



