REFORESTATION IN MASSACHUSETTS. 23 



Reforestation Act of 1908 (Chapter 478). 



AN ACT TO PROVIDE FOR THE PURCHASE OF FOREST LAND AND FOR 



REFORESTATION. 

 Be it enacted, etc., as follows: 



SECTION 1. For the purpose of experiment and illustration in forest 

 management and for the purposes specified in section seven of this 

 act, the sum of five thousand dollars may be expended in the year 

 nineteen hundred and eight, and the sum of ten thousand dollars an- 

 nually thereafter, by the state forester, with the advice and consent 

 of the governor and council, in purchasing lands situated within the 

 commonwealth and adapted to forest production. The price of such 

 land shall not exceed in any instance five dollars per acre, nor shall 

 more than forty acres be acquired in any one tract in any one year, 

 except that a greater area may so be acquired if the land purchased 

 directly affects a source or tributary of water supply in any city or 

 town of the commonwealth. All lands acquired under the provisions 

 of this act shall be conveyed to the commonwealth, and no lands shall 

 "be paid for nor shall any moneys be expended in improvements thereon 

 until all instruments of conveyance and the title to be transferred 

 thereby have been approved by the attorney-general and until such 

 instruments have been executed and recorded. 



SECTION 2. The owners of land purchased under this act, or their 

 heirs and assigns, may repurchase the land from the commonwealth 

 at any time within ten years after the purchase by the commonwealth, 

 upon paying the price originally paid by the commonwealth, together 

 with the amount expended in improvements and maintenance, with 

 interest at the rate of four per cent per annum on the purchase price. 

 The state forester, with the approval of the governor and council, may 

 execute in behalf of the commonwealth such deeds of reconveyance 

 as may be necessary under this section: provided, however, that there 

 shall be included in such deeds a restriction requiring that trees cut 

 from such property shall not be less than eight inches in diameter 

 at the butt. 



SECTION 3. The state forester may in his discretion, but subject 

 to the approval of the deed and title by the attorney-general as pro- 

 vided in section one, accept on behalf of the commonwealth gifts of 

 land to be held and managed for the purpose hereinbefore expressed. 

 A donor of such land may reserve the right to buy back the land in 

 accordance with the provisions of section two, but in the absence of 

 a provision to that effect in his deed of gift he shall not have such 

 right. 



SECTION 4. Land acquired under the provisions of this act shall be 

 under the control and management of the state forester who may, sub- 



