12 



As in previous years some of the burned area was due to farmers 

 who kindled their brush or fallows in violation of the law forbidding 

 agricultural work of this kind between April ist and June ist. But 

 each offender of this class, as shown farther on in this report, was 

 arrested and punished. 



Some conflagrations were started by incendiaries and degenerates, 

 prompted by malice, revenge, or criminal instincts. It has been 

 alleged that some fires were set by men in order to get employment ; 

 but no evidence whatever has been furnished thus far in support of 

 this theory. The rate of wages for fighting fire in each town is fixed 

 by the town board of auditors not by the State. The price varies 

 in the different towns from $1.25 to $2 per day. The work, when 

 properly performed, is the hardest and most exhaustive that men 

 are ever called upon to do, and the wages paid were none too high 

 for the service rendered. In view of the scarcity of labor and high 

 wages in the Adirondacks there was little or no need of any one 

 becoming an incendiary in order to get work. A man who would 

 set fire to the woods is a criminal in every sense of the word. Now, 

 a criminal will commit crime in order to evade work but not to 

 get work. The arduous service required by the firewardens offers 

 no inducement to men of this character. Granted, that bad men will 

 burn the woods through motives of revenge ; but hardly to get honest 

 employment. In each case where a man was convicted of incendiar- 

 ism last spring, it was noticed that he had not applied to any fire- 

 warden for employment. Furthermore, the towns, as a rule, do not 

 pay immediately, but wait until the board of supervisors meets in 

 December to apportion the money for the .payment of their fire 

 accounts and other expenses; and these payments are delayed still 

 further until the taxes then levied can be collected. Every man in 

 the Adirondacks knows this; for the delay is a matter of common 



