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required to render the climate healthful for man, and 

 to the growth of the plants which man cultivates to 

 supply his daily wants and for the purposes of civil- 

 ization ; and that when the halance inclined too much 

 cither way, unhealthiness of the climate for man and 

 his domesticated plants and animals was the result. 

 Examples of this may be seen in various colonies, 

 Mauritius in particular. Before the balance of 

 forest and arable land required by the law of nature 

 can be restored to that island, a large sum of money 

 (about £200,000 sterling) will have to be expended 

 in the purchase of land, planting and protecting 

 the forests, and likely a generation will pass away 

 before the desired results are attained. To avoid these 

 dangers, and preserve that salubrity of climate, for 

 which, as a tropical land, Eiji is noted among the 

 islands of the Pacific, it will be necessary for the 

 Government of the colony, in the disposition of lands, 

 to set apart large forest reserves in both the wet and 

 dry districts. These reserves should include, if possible, 

 all the mountain and hill tops (in a proportion of one- 

 third of their slopes), the land surrounding springs, 

 and at the watershed and sources of rivers and streams ; 

 in short, the timber should be preserved on the 

 land on which the water in the streamlets, &c, 

 fa collected. To effect this properly, and perhaps 

 for other reasons, it would be unwise to dispose of 

 more than one half of the land at one time in any 

 district, even niter the forest reserves have been 

 se1 apart. After the lands disposed of have been 

 l»(l and cultivated, and the country opened up by 

 roads, &c., the remaining half of the lands will be 

 easily :tnd profitably leased or sold. And as some 

 climatical experience of the district will have been 



