86 PROTECTION AGAINST MAN. 



Another case in Western India is the use of green branches, 

 termed rab, as manure in rice -fields. Here similar rules 

 should be adopted as long as this practice is allowed. 



(vii) In every case where leaf-fodder is used by right- 

 holders, the people should be induced, as far as possible, to 

 cut and preserve hay or ensilage, or to grow root-crops for the 

 winter-fodder of their animals. Leaf-fodder from forests will 

 always prove a valuable resource when other fodder fails, 

 as was the case in France and Germany during the drought 

 of 1893. 



d. Grass for Fodder, Thatch, etc. 



Rights of cutting grass are also of very common occurrence 

 under the coppice systems, and they should be limited according 

 to locality, time, and mode of exercise, the limitations which 

 prevail varying according to local law or custom. They can 

 commence only at a certain age of the wood, and the close- 

 time must be regulated according to species, and to specified 

 days, when the forest guard can supervise the grass-cutting. 

 Sometimes the grass must be plucked by hand, or sickles or 

 scythes may be used ; the latter instrument is evidently not 

 admissible amongst young plants. If properly regulated and 

 supervised, this usage does little or no harm on moist fertile 

 soil, and may even assist in fire-conservancy by removing a 

 great source of danger, and also prove useful during the 

 reproduction of the forest. It is also often usefully allowed 

 as a compromise for grazing when that cannot be allowed, 

 and yet the stoppage is a hardship. 



e. Forest Pasture. 



This right allows the holder to graze his own cattle on the 

 grasses and other herbage springing up in a forest belong- 

 ing to some other person. The right to cut grass is not 

 included. The forest owner has the power of closing certain 

 areas in his forest, but cannot introduce changes of the system 

 of management which will prejudice the right. 



The species and number of grazing beasts may be defined, 

 or not. If the species is not mentioned, animals such as the 



