THE STATE AND PRIVATE OWNERS 263 



already in existence, the purchase of additional areas as 

 opportunities occur, and the grading up of the official 

 staff. 



The first essential is the separate administration of the 

 work of forestry from mines, buildings, quit and ground 

 rents, and other forms of property administered by the 

 office. The forests should be, as fortunately they are at 

 present, in charge of an enthusiastic commissioner, and 

 not divided between two as in the past, one of whom 

 may not take the slightest interest in forestry, another 

 be a keen advocate of a forward policy. The most im- 

 portant portion of the woods has sometimes been in 

 charge of the former, and an insignificant fraction en- 

 trusted to the latter. Under such conditions no uniform 

 or definite policy could be promoted, and it is absolutely 

 absurd to find, as might easily be the case, a highly 

 conscientious and zealous officer in charge of one forest, 

 and the younger son of a peer, chiefly occupied in sport 

 and frivolities, in charge of another. Such striking 

 anomalies as these may not occur in practice, but there 

 is nothing to prevent them under the present (or let it 

 be hoped past) system of filling vacancies in the State 

 woods, and it is obvious that it inspires neither confidence 

 nor enthusiasm in those having the interests of British 

 forestry at heart. 



For much of the higher administrative work a thorough 

 knowledge of scientific forestry may not be necessary, but 

 a commissioner of woods should certainly know the differ- 

 ence between good and bad work, and be competent 

 to criticise the general result of his subordinates' work. 

 The chief duties of a forest commissioner ought to be 

 the extraction of money from the Treasury, and its 

 expenditure in purchasing and developing lands and 

 woods. As the work progresses it may be found that a 

 separate forest commissioner for England, Wales, and 



