Wo MODERN FOREST ECONOMY. 



doubts on these points, I would point to the Swinley 

 Woods, under the charge of Mr Menzies, and portions of 

 the New Forest under Mr Cumberbatch, which may 

 challenge comparison with any oak plantations of the 

 same age on the Contiaent ; but I do think, and am sure 

 that any who have studied the subject, and made them- 

 selves thoroughly acquainted with it by personal observa- 

 tion, will agree with me, that, compared with most of the 

 German States, we are behindhand as regards the 

 systematic and scientific management of forests on a large 

 scale, and as a part of political economy to which it is 

 incumbent on a Government to attend. In fact, looked at 

 in this light, I venture to affirm that we are as far behind 

 Germany in the knowledge and applicatian of scientific 

 forestry as we are in advance with regard to agricultural 

 pursuits. ....... 



'The Government [of India] having granted, by the 

 gradual formation of a distinct forest service, the necessity 

 of establishing a system of forest conservancy, and 

 administering and working the forests by degrees on more 

 well-defined principles and to the best advantage, the 

 question naturally presents itself Where are we to look 

 for a model or precedent on which to work? and the reply 

 appears ready. To Germany, where forestry, and par- 

 ticularly the management of forests by the State, has been 

 carried on for hundreds of years, not the mere planting 

 of a few hundred acres here, or reserving a few thousand 

 acres there, but a general system of forest management, 

 commencing by a careful survey, stock-taking, definition and 

 commutation of all rights and servitudes, careful experi- 

 ments in the rate of growth, the best soil for each descrip- 

 tion of tree; in fact, in every branch of the subject, and 

 resulting in what .we find to-day in Hanover, for instance 

 hundreds of thousands of acres mapped, divided into 

 periods and blocks, and worked to the best advantage 

 both with regard to present and future, and the annual 

 yield of which now and for many years to come is known 

 and fixed to within a few hundred cubic feet. . 



