1907 DEPARTMENT OF LANDS, FORESTS AND MINES. 223 



land iu the United States at 6s. 3d. per acre, and suppose these lands were 

 timbered, it would take 150 feet of pine timber at ^d. per cubic foot (the 

 Government duties) to paj for an acre of land, about two trees to the acre 

 of a very ordinary size, being only 75 feet average. Now it will be observed 

 that if the Government onlv get duties on two trees to the acre they get this 

 price with the land left, which is certainly worth something even should 

 it be given to an actual settler. But the fact is one acre of good timbered 

 land will afford on the average at least about five times the quantity above 

 mentioned. His remarks on this score may be quite applicable to prairie 

 lands, where little or no timber is to be found, but can never apply to lands 

 where there are to be found 150 feet on an acre, and the price according to 

 his estimate. I may add that I have only taken pine timber in the above 

 calculation, which pays a much less duty than other descriptions such as 

 oak, elm, etc." 



Andrew J. Russell, Crown Lands agent at Bytown, urged that past 

 experience was strongly against the uncontrolled acquisition of land in 

 blocks. "Were such a blight," he said, "to fall on the lands fit for settle- 

 ment on the Ottawa it would check the consolidation of the Province as an 

 inhabited country, and be injurious to its unity and strength. For there, 

 as the chief value of the land is in its timber forests, we know it would be 

 for that it would be purchased by speculators ; the soil would be little thought 

 of. The lumbering which is causelessly complained of now would then 

 certainly be the governing interest and settlement be entirely at its mercy. 

 Government would have lost all control of the land which it now retains and 

 the immediate interest of the speculator would overrule the interest of the 

 Province. * * * '\^\^q unconditional sale of lands could not possibly 

 forward settlement more than the present system — would be advantageous 

 to the speculators but fatally injurious to the revenue and might, by checking 

 settlement, be injurious to the welfare of the Province." 



Private Ownership. 



How well-founded these objections to the American system were has 

 been amply shown by the experience of later years. The alienation of exten- 

 sive tracts of the public domain of the United States has not promoted econ- 

 omical methods of lumbering with an eye to maintaining the productiveness 

 of the forests for the benefit of future generations. On the contrary it has 

 resulted in large regions adapted by nature for tree-bearing, but otherwise 

 unproductive, being stripped entirely of their vegetation with the object of 

 realizing immediate profit and turned into barren wastes, while the fact 

 that the ownership of the soil remains vested in private hands is a serious 

 obstacle to such comprehensive plans of reforestation as in the light of the 

 increased knowledge of the subject and the urgent necessities of the case 

 might otherwise be undertaken. In those instances where it is sought to 

 accomplish something in the direction of setting aside forest reserves, the 

 State governments either find their schemes confined within narrow limits 

 or rendered abortive by the conflict with vested rights which should never 

 have been accorded, or find themselves compelled to repurchase at a heavy 

 cost the lands necessary for their purpose. 



Early Forestry Advocates. — Bogus Settlers. 



The evidence of several of those who testified before the committ<'e 

 shows that practical men at that time realized the desirability of maintain- 

 ing permanently in timber the non-agricultural regions and understood tliat 



