FOREST F1KP:S IN NORTH AMERICA 275 



New Jersey 52 per cent 



New Hampshire 44 per cent 



New York 42 per cent 



Delaware 42 per cent 



Pennsylvania 35 per cent 



Massachusetts 33 per cent 



so that in the most highly cultivated districts, and those having the thickest 

 network of railways, the figures rise to a fearful height, which suffices to 

 explain the above given high totals of the individual fires in these districts. 

 In Tennessee, only 8 per cent of the total was due to locomotive sparks; in 

 Alabama 6 per cent, in Georgia 4 per cent, and in Mississippi but 3 per cent, 

 because the railway systems of these states are much less developed, so that in 

 general, fires in those states must be ascribed to other causes. For the north- 

 ern states the results of this investigation had a practical fruit, inasmuch as 

 it led to the passing of laws to regulate the railways and to compel them to 

 take steps to prevent damage or at least to confine it to the narrowest limits. 

 These laws have been enforced with unquestionable success. 



That the carelessness and conscienceless negligence of hunters, stockmen, 

 lumbermen, prospectors, and tourists, who light fires for one purpose or 

 another in the forests or around their borders, was the cause of a very much 

 larger number of forest fires in every state of the Union without exception, has 

 been sufficiently proved by the statistics of the year 1880. But in so broad 

 an area of what is still largely a primeval wilderness, the root of the evil is 

 much more difficult to get at. What is needed above all is a thorough-going 

 organization of the forces and available means for forest protection, as well as 

 a slow and long-continued campaign of education. In this direction the sta- 

 tistics in question have evidently borne fruit, especially since a later census 

 of forest fires taken in 1891 by the Forestry Division of the Department of 

 Agriculture, which gave similar conclusions to the previous ones of Walker. 

 It is true these reports were still extremely incomplete, but then they related 

 to a much larger area burned over in the year in which they were taken, 

 namely, 12,000,000 acres. Besides, everyone who was familiar with the facts 

 recognized that the figures of the years 1880 and 1891 were far below the 

 maximum of damage to the national domain which the forest fires of a single 

 year could reach, and that this maximum for the eighties and nineties 

 amounted to about ten times the value of the annual useful consumption of 

 wood. 



What a contrast was this situation to that in European countries, where 

 good forestry laws were in force! In the Prussian states, for the decade 

 ending with 1891, there were in all 156 greater fires, four of which were caused 

 by locomotives, three by lightning, 53 were of incendiary origin and 90 caused 

 by negligence, and the total area devastated during the year 1884 and 1887 

 was 3100 acres. Bavaria, in the year 1892, with its unusually hot and dry 

 summer, has a record of but 49 fires covering only 5000 acres. These figures 

 in comparison to those of North America are absolutely negligible, and form 

 a brilliant vindication of the forestry system of middle ]:]urope, while at the 

 same time they force us to the conclusion that in North America there are 

 other factors to be considered besides those above mentioned, although these 

 latter doubtless represent the principal causes of forest fires. 



The movement for a better system of forest management and forest pro- 

 tection became a very strong one in all the states of the Union during the 

 nineties and everywhere was productive of good results. In New York, Penn- 

 sylvania, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, 

 California, Oregon, and other states laws were passed for the protection of 



