32 CANADIAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



The fanner settling in the prairies finds himself compelled to make a number of 

 investments for the development of his property. These investments consist in the 

 erection of buildings, in the purchase of implements and live stock, in the construc- 

 tion of fences and ditches, roads, and so on. Similarly, the owner of a forest cannot 

 get along without adding to the original timber investment certain other components 

 which tend to bring the entire investment to the highest degree of remunerativeness 

 expressed in the highest possible annual surplus dividend. 



In many a case the forest owner is able to pay for these additional investments 

 by reducing the value of the original capital consisting of trees merely. 



It would be preposterous to advocate forestry, or the continued use of soil for 

 tiee growth, everywhere and under all conditions. Where the trees stand on absolutely 

 agricultural soil there forestry can pursue if it is a business the course of forest 

 destruction only, with a view to devoting such absolutely agricultural soil to that 

 production under which it pays best: agriculture. 



On the other hand, where the soil is unfit for the plough and unfit for pasture, 

 there the most remunerative industry possible is that of the production of timber. 



A legislative body when discussing the advisability of a far-sighted forest policy 

 is of necessity compelled to decide, on the basis of investigation and experiment, what 

 land within the limits of the commonwealth is absolute farm land, and what land is 

 absolute forest land. The policy pursued by the United States has never confronted 

 perhaps ignored, perhaps avoided this all important problem. In the eyes of the 

 American, if generalization be permitted, only one legitimate use of the soil is known, 

 and that is agricultural use. To him, forestry is merely a fad. 



In your association ' the problem of absolute forest land ' has been approached 

 to-day for the first time on this continent. It is difficult, perhaps impossible, to state 

 to-day what land is absolute forest land for all times to come. The conditions which 

 stamp a given acre of land as absolute forest land to-day may be changed by a fluctu- 

 ating population in days to come, may be altered by increased intensity and by new 

 agricultural methods, may be reversed by the introduction of new crops. In spite of 

 these possibilities, it is necessary that the legislature of a commonwealth delineate 

 a priori the conditions which put upon a given quality of soil in a given township the 

 stamp of absolute forest soil. 



Future generations may find that the original delineation was wrong; well and 

 good. Future generations may improve upon the present; but do not let us hesitate 

 to do during our day what we consider to be vitally connected with the interests of 

 our commonwealth. 



In the United States we meet only too often a mistaken, or a misled benevolence 

 interfering with a far-sighted forest policy. Many a state is desirous, above all, to 

 create ' happy homes for the poor ;' to prevent the workman from ' becoming a depen- 

 dent servant ; ' to make ' free-holding citizens ' out of ' immigrants accustomed to 

 servile dependence.' What is the consequence, only too often, of such benevolence? 

 The very poorest, and hence cheapest land, land forfeited for nonpayment of taxes, 

 land on which the last owner went bankrupt, is thrown open to ignorant immigrants, 



