INTRODUCTORY. 



The value of studying the historical development of 

 an economic subject or of a technical art which, like 

 forestry, relies to a large extent upon empiricism, lies 

 in the fact that it brings before us, in proper perspec- 

 tive, accumulated experience, and enables us to analyze 

 cause and effect, whereby we may learn to appreciate 

 the reasons for present conditions and the possibilities 

 for rational advancement. 



If there be one philosophy more readily derivable 

 than another from the study of the history of forestry 

 it is that history repeats itself. The same policies and 

 the same methods which we hear propounded to-day 

 have at some other time been propounded and tried 

 elsewhere: we can study the results, broadening our 

 judgment and thereby avoid the mistakes of others. 



Nowhere is the record of experience and the historic 

 method of study of more value than in an empiric art 

 like forestry, in which it takes decades, a lifetime, nay 

 a century to see the final effects of operations. 



Such study, if properly pursued, tends to free the 

 mind from many foolish prejudices and particularly 

 from an unreasonable partiality for our own country 

 and its customs and methods merely because they are 

 our own, substituting the proper patriotism, which ap- 

 plies the best knowledge, wherever found, to our own 

 necessities. 



Forestry is an art born of necessity, as opposed to 



