220 REPORT ON THE FORESTS OF INDIA. 



people, and to execute all operations of felling, conversion, trans- 

 port with intelligence and economy, so as to produce a fair revenue 

 from the estates administered by it ; and as a second result it is 

 expected to provide for the permanent maintenance of the yield; 

 but it will be readily conceived that, with the reserved forest, 

 limited to 2 per cent, of the total area, and with the demand 

 limited to timbers which occupy only a small percentage of the 

 reserved forest area, the achievement of the second result may be 

 incompatible with the achievement of the first. 



The Government has not laid down the diction that the forests 

 shall not be drained to an extent inconsistent with the permanent 

 maintenance of the supply, and while it encourages it does not 

 insist upon the department making valuations of its standing 

 stock, without which it is impossible to ascertain in how far the 

 current measure of exportation is justified; and although a Govern- 

 ment resolution will sometimes qualify its approval of a good 

 balance-sheet, by the remark that it would be more satisfactory if 

 any evidence had been adduced to show that the forests were in a 

 condition to meet the current drain upon them permanently, the 

 general tenor of their resolutions with respect to financial resulte 

 is such as to impress the department with the conviction that very 

 satisfactory data would be necessary to justify any important 

 diminution of revenue ; the consequence is that, while the market- 

 able stock is in a great number of instances undergoing rapid 

 diminution, the revenues of the department are steadily increasing. 



In the financial year 1864-65 the revenue of the department for 

 the whole of India amounted in round numbers to £381,000, with 

 an expenditure of £193,000 ; and for the next ten years there was 

 a steady enhancement of revenue, which amounted in 1871-75 to 

 £6-17,000 : but meantime expenditure grew as rapidly as revenue, 

 amounting in the latter year to £449,000, from which it will be 

 seen that the net revenue remains nearly stationary; but this 

 increase in expenditure is due largely to an important increase in 

 the supervising staff, and to increased expenditure on account of 

 plantations ; for fostering natural reproduction by the exclusion of 

 fires, for surveys, etc., all tending to the future well-being of the 

 forests. 



A net annual revenue of less than £200,000 is not a very con- 

 siderable return from 12,000 square miles of forest, especially 

 when it is borne in mind that no adequate efforts are being made 

 to replace the timber exported by a fresh growth ; but, as I have 



