4 ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT, NOVEMBER 6, 1872. 



the forests to take place, and. ultimately denudation follows, with, its 

 many attendant evils; and often when it is too late the maintenance 

 of forest riches for the first time engages the attention of the legis- 

 lature. 



That such has not heen the result in our own country is doubtless 

 due to our insular position, and to our rich resources of mineral fuel. 

 Of the first, and the advantage we therehy possess of heing able to 

 draw supplies from all quarters of the globe, nothing short of a con- 

 vulsion of nature can deprive us ; hut in regard to the second, the 

 recent disturbance in the lahour market may well make us thankful 

 that the time has not yet come when the sinister prognostications of 

 our experts as to the remaining extent of our coal measures have 

 heen fulfilled, so far as to oblige us to resort much to vegetable fuel 

 as a substitute. In this connection, I may he permitted to express 

 my conviction that much good may result from the present lahour 

 movement in the introduction of coal-cutting machinery, and the 

 consequent diminution of the number of human beings employed 

 under ground, and in the needful economising of the back-bone of 

 our national wealth — our coal. And in this last remark, foresters 

 will at once recognise, though indirectly, the importance of their 

 calling. It is where timber is the fuel in use for domestic purposes 

 that the value of the forester's work has come to be most appreciated, 

 and we accordingly find that in foreign countries destitute of coal 

 resources, or backward in their development, the legislature has been 

 compelled to intervene to provide for the maintenance of the forests. 



If, then, we would profit to the utmost by the experience of others 

 in this important branch of economics, we must not rest content with 

 a knowledge of the results attained in the narrow sphere presented 

 within our own native land, or of the way in which those results 

 have been reached ; most valuable as such knowledge is, theconditions 

 under which it has been accumulated, though diverse, are not suffi- 

 ciently comprehensive to afford the conclusive data which will be 

 obtained by a study of the matured system of conservancy and re- 

 production that has grown up in those countries where vast forests 

 are held by the state in trust for the people, and the operations are 

 conducted on a scale commensurate with the interests involved, not 

 only in the immediate present, but in the long distant future. 



Bearing in mind what I have already said as to the circumstances 

 which gradually lead to the ultimate denudation of countries, it will 

 be no matter of surprise to you to learn, that in an empire in which 

 we are all deeply interested, which numbers a population of probably 



