1907 DEPARTMENT OF LANDS, FORESTS AND MINES. 219 



low price for casli only. He regarded the denial of the right of the bona 

 iide settler to sell timber as a hardship. "The plan adopted in my own 

 management," he wrote, "and which I think might be followed with advan- 

 tage, is to require the party purchasing the timber to account for it at the 

 usual rate of stumpage, and the amount is thereupon passed to the credit of 

 the purchaser of the land." 



The Reciprocity Treaty. 



Further observations made in this communication deal with a question, 

 which was assuming prominence in connection with lumbering operations 

 in consequence of the existing and prospective development of the export 

 trade to the United States on a large scale. The adoption of the Reciprocity 

 Treaty in 1854 securing <he free exchange of the natural products between 

 Canada and the United States, including "timber and lumber of all kinds, 

 round, hewed and sawed, manufactured in whole or in part," stimulated 

 considerably the growing demand in the United States for Canadian lumber. 

 In proportion as the market for sawn lumb-er developed, the cutting of 

 square timberj for long the leading branch of the industry, declined in 

 importance and became less essential to the prosperity of the lumbering 

 interest. The disadvantages of the square timber trade as compared with 

 that of sa^n lumber, more especially its wastefulness and the greater danger 

 of forest fires involved by the debris and litter left in the woods, began to 

 attract attention. Hon. A. T. Gait's remarks on the question in the letter 

 before mentioned are as follows : 



Square Timber Wasteful. 



"Timber trade of Canada until the development of the American market, 

 was almost confined to the export of square timber and deals. Apart from 

 the indirect advantages of thus, employing a large number of ships giving 

 cheap passage to emigrants, I have always regarded the export of square 

 timber as a. profligate waste of one of the greatest sources of Provincial 

 wealth. I believe it is at this day entirely unnecessary to enter into any 

 argument to prove that the value of our forests to the country is precisely 

 in proportion to the amount of labor expended in preparing the timber for 

 market, and that therefore the more crude and raw stat« in which it is 

 exported the less value the trade is to the Province. 



"It must be conceded that it is most desirable to adopt such a policy as 

 will cause capital, skill and labor to be most generally embarked in the 

 trade, and this can o^ly be done by holding out in the disposal of the timber^ 

 greater inducements to manufacture it into sawn lumber than into square 

 timber, which latter wastes the finest portion of the wood, and represents 

 th^ smallest amount of fixed capital and labor in its preparation. 



"The importance of this distinction it appears to me, has never been 

 sufiiciently realized in the conditions under which timber limits have been 

 disposed of. And I would strongly urge the consideration of it on the Com- 

 mittee with the view of their recommending such rates as may have a 

 tendency to induce the export of timT)er in a manufactured state. One of 

 two things must at present arise, either an inadequate rate must continue 

 to be charged for saw logs, or an absolute bonus must be given to encour- 

 age the manufacture of that class of timber which is least valuable to the 

 Province, 



