FIREWARDEN'S REPORT. 41 



A year ago the record showed 10 cases from 1910 to be settled, 

 all of which a-e now disposed oi. Of the 109 violations in 1911 that 

 fell as a Ip^acy to 1912, there are now but 12 left to be adjusted. 

 (See Tables VIII and IX and summary in Table VI) All these 

 are railroad claims on which settlement is looked for shortly with- 

 out further attention, save in one instance where the case may be 

 taken into court. There still remain four cases from previous years, 

 and one in the current year, in which the violator by leaving the 

 State has escaped the law. It is again emphasized, as last year, that 

 while these cases should not jroperly be charged against the un- 

 finished business of the service, there is no intention to permit them 

 to lapse. In some, if not all, of these cases it is presumed that the 

 offender will return and be penalized later, as happened this year 

 it one instance, when a violator who had taken up his residence in 

 Philadelphia was found in New Jersey, tried and convicted. 



The attitude of the railroads again gives evidence of their belief 

 in the work of the Service. Settlement of expenses for putting out 

 fire is readily made in each case if there is reasonable ground to be- 

 lieve a locomotive set the fire, and if claim is made promptly enough 

 to allow the company to verify the facts. So long as the roads con- 

 tinue their co-operation with the service, and unless gross careless- 

 ness or willful disregard for forest interests is shown, this treatment 

 of the situation seems the most equitable. Of 207 railroad violation 

 claims this year, 72 have been paid and 15 dropped because the 

 township's bill was too late to permit of making a claim. Final dis- 

 position of most of the 120 claims still unsatisfied only awaits the 

 next regular date of settlement under an agreement with several of 

 the railroads by which payments are made periodically instead of 

 individually for each case as submitted. 



A total of $1,312.19* in penalites was collected in 1912, $944.85 

 from the railroads and $367.34 from elsewhere. Of this latter 

 sum the larger portion was paid by 19 individual offenders with 

 one other case in which a gravel company settled for fighting a 

 fire set by its engine. These sums are returned in every instance 

 to the townships involved in such a way that they and the State 

 are relieved of the whole expense of fighting the fires. 





*0f this amount $144.35 was received too late to be included in the finan- 

 ial ^tatpiiu'iit of Ilic year (See p. 14), but was paid on October 31. 



