232 REPORT OF THE No. 3 



adopted to prevent it, to consider the expediency of reserving as forests the 

 extensive tracts of land which abound in exportable timber, but are unsuit- 

 able for cultivation; of enacting a Forest Lave, and to suggest that system 

 which in its opinion is best adapted to the requirements and conditions of 

 the country." No report was ever made by this committee, the approach 

 of the era of political storm and stress which immediately preceded Confed- 

 eration, and the pressure of more immediate and exigent issues doubtless 

 absorbing all the attention of the legislators. 



In 1865 a change in the fiscal year came into operation, in accordance 

 with which the Crown Lands and other departmental reports presented in 

 1866 covered the period from the 1st July, 1864, to 30th June, 1865, instead 

 of coinciding with the calendar year. Hon. Alexander Campbell, Commis- 

 sioner of Crown Lands, in his report for that year showed himself to be 

 thoroughly alive to the necessity of an advanced forestry policy on the line 

 of a strict discrimination between cultivatable and non-agricultural lands, 

 and the setting apart of the latter as permanent timber reserves. The fol- 

 lowing paragraph sets forth his views on the subject : 



Reserves Advocated. 



''The value of a very large area of our remaining public lands, as a 

 pine country, is well understood and has not been exaggerated. The 

 exports of the products of the Canadian forests for the seven years termin- 

 ating 31st December, 1863, deducting timber imported, were valued at 

 173,004,312 ; the value of the products of agriculture consumed in the coun- 

 try I have no means of ascertaining, but the exports of such products dur- 

 ing the same period, with a similar deduction, were valued at $49,951,961. 

 Though much of it has been denuded of its valuable timber, it is the opinion 

 of the best informed that a large area remains untouched; happily for the 

 interests of the country, the pine exists on lands for the most part unfit for 

 settlement. It needs a careful discrimination between pine lands exclusively 

 and lands fit for settlement, to place it in the power of the Government to 

 conserve this valuable source of national wealth. Should the whole of our 

 uncultivatable lands be set apart, as I think should be done, as a pine region, 

 and no sales made there, the land would, if the trees were cut under a sys- 

 tem of rotation such as is now adopted in Norway and Sweden and in many 

 of the German states, recuperate their growth of merchantable pine in cycles 

 of 30 and 40 years, and pine growing might be continued and preserved 

 for ages to come. In view of the future requirements of this continent and 

 of Europe, and of the singular advantages Canada enjoys as a pine-pro- 

 ducing country, I humbly submit that it is of the utmost importance that 

 we should now take steps in this direction." 



One result of the continued discussion of the subject and the incon- 

 veniences arising from growing scarcity of wood in the older settled por- 

 tions of Lower Canada, was the passage of the following Act, applicable to 

 that Province alone, which received the Royal assent on the 17th day of Sep- 

 tember, 1865. 



The Act of 1865. 



An Act to provide for the preservation of standing timber. 



''Whereas in most of the old counties of Canada the inhabitants experi- 

 ence serious difficulty in obtaining wood for fuel and building purposes, 

 and whereas it is advisable to profit by past experience, and to adopt 

 measures while there is yet time, to prevent the inhabitants of new town- 



1 6a L. M. 



