18 FOREST CULTURE AND 
advise to be adopted in the first instance, as well for 
the supervision, enrichment, and utilization of our 
nitive forests as for creating also new ones. On vari- 
ous oceasions I have alluded to such a plan of surveil- 
lance before. More recently, though only passingly, 
in a lecture delivered at this hall, I advocated the 
formation of local Forest Boards in the different dis- 
tricts of our colonial territory. 7arious considera- 
tions led me to recommend this system. The admin- 
istration, as an honorary one, would involve no direct 
expenditure to the State. It would bring to bear in 
each locality special watchfulness and local talent. 
In each district could readily be found a few inhabit- 
ants who not only possess some knowledge of tree- 
culture in general, but who, also, by their. direct in- 
terest in the present and future welfare of the locality 
in which they live, in which they gained experiences, 
in which they hold property, and in which they rear- 
ed a family, would be induced, as much for the sake 
of direct and lasting advantages as from patriotic 
motives, to devote the needful time for serving on a 
local Forest Board. But there are still other weighty 
advantages, which claim support for this proposition. 
Various tracts of the Victorian territory are—as might 
be imagined — very unlike in climate and geologic 
structure. Each locality shows peculiar adaptabilities 
for special trees to be selected. One district can afford, 
by the possession of more extensive primeval forests, 
to be far more heavily taxed in its timber resources 
than another ; one tract of country can produce remu- 
neratively certain trees, which it would be hopeless 
to attempt raising in another locality. Some exten- 
sive areas have no forests at all, and in others they 
