ory in order to recall some instance where a fire started with 

 the intention of clearing up a little land had destroyed some 

 other man's home or burned up some valuable timber. Occa- 

 sionally it has come back like a boomerang and detsroyed 

 the home of the very man who set it. On the other hand it 

 is yet easier to recall many instances where fires have been 

 thus used to the great advantage of the settler without any 

 apparent injury to anyone. Naturally the damaging fires re- 

 ceive the most attention and make a greater impression on 

 public opinion. This leads many people to make the rather 

 rash decision that all use of fire in the clearing of land should 

 be prohibited. 



The man in the city or on the prairie, who has no land to 

 clear and whose only knowledge of the conditions in the for- 

 ested areas is obtained from the newspaper accounts of the 

 property destroyed and the lives lost in the forest fires, 

 knows nothing of the necessities involved in the clearing of 

 land and is rather indifferently in favor of any law which 

 tends to lessen that damage regardless of the hardship he is 

 unwittingly putting on some settler. The settler who has 

 already cleared his land whether by fire or otherwise and 

 has put many valuable improvements on his farm in the 

 shape of buildings, fences, haystacks, etc., also supports 

 energetically any law which promises to protect that prop- 

 erty from destruction. It is a matter of self-defense with 

 him and he cannot afford to take any chances ; the more rigor- 

 ous the law the better it suits him. 



The timber owner has the same point of view. 



Were these three classes the only ones to be consid- 

 ered the forest fire problem would be a simple one; the strict- 

 est possible laws could be passed and the people would see 

 to it that they were rigidly enforced. But there is another 

 side to the question. Many of the claims in the North coun- 

 try are entirely covered with forest or brush and the set- 

 tlers too short of capital to afford to clear them by other 

 means than burning. These settlers have their rights and 

 their needs must be considered; must, indeed, be very 

 leniently considered, for they are engaged in a life of hard- 

 ships which will add to the wealth of the state. They are 



