NOTES ON CONTINENTAL FORESTRY IN 1906. 65 
This is how the internal position in France strikes some of 
those who are studying it so carefully :— 
“In this review it is almost superfluous to repeat that the 
forestal situation is not satisfactory. No one has forgotten the 
grave warnings given by M. Mélard in 1goo [as to the world’s 
timber-production decreasing, while the demands for wood are 
increasing |. 
“On the one hand, the forests not placed under regular 
control are disappearing, especially in the mountains, through 
easy evasion of the ineffectual provisions of the Forest Law as to 
felling. 
“On the other hand, rewooding goes on so slowly that it does 
not keep pace with the damage that meanwhile increases and 
extends. It is a work of Sisyphus. ‘Since one has been plant- 
ing, or pretending to plant,’ as Thomas Grimm very truly said in 
the Petit Journal of 2nd December 1904, ‘all our mountains ought 
to have resumed their luxuriant covering of former days.’ But 
after 45 years of effort and expense, and of scientific and zealous 
work, the sum total of our additions is less than 495,000 acres, 
scattered over the south, centre, and south-east of France.” 
These facts are being discussed and commented on over the whole 
length and breadth of France, and pressure is being brought to 
bear on the Government to have the Rewooding Law of April 
1882 amended, so that progress may become more rapid. 
Savants, university professors, civil engineers, and the press 
condemn its faults. ‘‘The south-west, having navigable rivers, 
has inscribed forestal reform as the foremost of its claims, and 
in Parliament the discussion of the budget gives rise to warm 
pleading in favour of forests and replanting. And these are 
encouraging signs.” 
“One cannot deny,” writes M. Pardé of Beauvais in the 
preamble to another very interesting article on ‘‘ The Forestry 
Question in France,” “that forestry is one of the questions of 
the day in France, as in other countries. It is handled almost 
daily in reviews and journals by writers of various professions; 
it is inscribed on the programme of several select committees; 
numerous societies concern themselves with it; committees are 
formed in different localities to try and solve it. The problem 
has two aspects: to preserve and improve the existing wood- 
lands, and to create new woods on waste lands.” 
VOL. XX. PART I. E 
