CANADIAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION 97 



everybody they have come in contact with. And so we are doing an educative work, 

 as well as a most practical work, in this direction. 



Mr. HUTT. So you are. 



Mr. WHITE. Then we have set apart enormous forest reserves, and I said last 

 night, and I repeat it now, that the policy of the Government of Ontario, or any other 

 Government that has large timber areas, ought to he to absolutely exclude settlement 

 from territory that is not capable of supporting an agricultural population. In the 

 past too little attention has been paid to that, as you know, in the Muskoka district 

 for instance, the Government of Ontario sold the timber in 1871 and immediately 

 opened the whole country for settlement and allowed settlers to flow in, and the lumber 

 men had to take that timber off inside of five years or else they lost their title. Let 

 us see for a moment what took place there. 



Mr. BERTRAM. Was that a five-year limit in 1871? 



Mr. WHITE. No, we opened the district for settlement and the settler could get 

 his patent in five years, therefore the lumberman had" to take his timber off or he 

 might lose it. 



Mr. BERTRAM. But you continued it afterwards? 



Mr. WHITE. I am just going to tell you what took place. Before the five years 

 were up the lumbermen went to the settler and said, ' you are going to get your patent 

 in April or May,' and the settler would say, 'yes,' then the lumberman would say, 

 ' I can go on and cut your lumber this winter, and I will do so unless you sell it to 

 me.' The alternative for the settler was taking something for it, or getting nothing, 

 and he took what was offered, but the province lost seventy-five cents a thousand dues. 

 I took the opportunity of writing the then Commissioner, Mr. Pardee, and saying to 

 him that unless some plan could be devised whereby that sort of thing could be put an 

 end to we would very soon lose most of our revenue from that country. The House did 

 pass an Act reserving the pine timber from the settler for all time, not only until 

 the issue of the patent, but for all time, and in that way we stopped that leak. When 

 selling under pressure in the way spoken of, the settler did not, as a matter of fact, 

 get more than five or ten cents a thousand for his timber, and the province lost seventy- 

 five. It was therefore provided in the amendment to the Free Grants, Act to give the 

 settler a refund of one-third of the dues on his timber land after being patented, 

 which meant a great deal more than he had been getting. We now give the settler 

 thirty-three cents on every thousand feet cut on his land after the land is patented, 

 and so the time is pushed further back in which the lumberman has to cut the timber, 

 and the interests of the Crown and the settler are protected. Now, I have told you 

 what we are doing in the direction of conserving pine timber, and I think you are 

 advised that the Government is not only alive to what is its duty in the premises but 

 is anxious enough to be informed by anybody who has got an opinion worth listening 

 to as to what is the best course to pursue in the future. 



Mr. Hutt divided his subject into two heads, one dealing with the forest wealth 

 where the country was unsettled, and the other with the older and more settled parts 



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