246 



THE FORESTER. 



October, 



great number of fires, and to abate the 

 evil a law was passed punishing any one 

 wantonly setting fire to the forests. The 

 punishment was this : the offender was 

 bound hand and foot and drawn three 

 times through the fire. Although this 

 punishment was inflicted upon offenders, 

 the destruction continued until the forests 

 were well guarded. 



The question of protecting the small 

 portion of forests still remaining and of 

 rehabilitating the vast areas that have been 



succeed, can do more than we. Their 

 rivers have returned, and all the manifold 

 blessings induced by forests. 



When once the management of our for- 

 ests is placed, to remain, in the hands of 

 our skilled foresters, backed up with lib- 

 eral appropriations and unhampered by 

 political parties, then the wanton waste 

 and destruction will be reduced to the 

 minimum. So our forests, being rehabili- 

 tated with all blessings, will soon become 

 self-supporting. 



FIG. 2. SCENE IN SAME FOREST ONE WEEK LATER, SHOWING EOPPINGS LEFT AFTER CUTTING. 



denuded, can only be accomplished by the 

 adoption of a rational forest system. Why 

 should our country, so enlightened and so 

 far in advance of other nations in the me- 

 chanical arts and industries, be so lax and 

 deficient in the management of its forests? 

 Surely not for lack of skill and intelli- 

 gence. We cannot concede that Germany, 

 France, and other nations that are not only 

 realizing a direct profit from their forests, 

 but have rebuilded agriculture to a profit- 

 able plane, without which no country can 



There is abundant proof that the moun- 

 tains of southern California were once 

 heavily timbered. Fully So per cent, of 

 all the area now is covered with brush, 

 but for the most part sparsely. This brush, 

 naturally very inflammable, when heated 

 by a few weeks of constant sunshine be- 

 comes as tinder, and a fire once started is 

 most difficult to control; in fact it cannot 

 be controlled until fire breaks are made by 

 removing the brush along the ridges. The 

 handful of men employed as rangers, one 





