1912 AND FISHERIES COMMISSION. 147 



reasonably be claimed from the railwaj-s. Most especially would this 

 apply where new lines are being cut through a virgin or almost untouched 

 forest area, for there, with the forests still standing and unburnt, the 

 conditions about the rights of way will be most favourable for the des- 

 tructive agency of fire. The great bulk of the present forest resources 

 of the Province are only now being pierced by railways and doubtless 

 in the near future still other roads will be planned and constructed 

 in these regions, so that it would appear that this question of fuel con- 

 sumption by the railways might well receive the most earnest consider- 

 ation of the i)rovincial administration. 



Even, however, where the engines consume coal a great deal can 

 be done to lessen the risks of fire. There can plainly be no excuse for 

 the railways failing to keep their rights of way clear of inflammable 

 material or debris, or not complying with the regulations in regard to 

 the use of spark^arrestors, and in view of the fact that these are wealthy 

 corporations the penalty for any laxity or remissness in these directions 

 should be punished with a fine sufficiently severe as to render any repe- 

 tition of the offence unlikely. Grovernment inspectors should be along 

 and about the roads continually, and when any clearing is obviously 

 needed and it is not promptly executed by the railway officials, it should 

 be carried out under the direction of the government inspector and the 

 expense charged to the railway company in addition to a commensurate 

 fine. Tlie question, indeed, of efficient patrolment of railways' in opera- 

 tion is of no less, if not actually of greater, importance than that of 

 railways under construction, for although undoubtedly the construc- 

 tion gangs on the latter require constant watching, the chances of fires 

 being started by them and not extinguished promptly are not to be com- 

 pared with those of a series of engines passing to and fro, by day and 

 by night, vomiting forth a stream of cinders and sparks. The construc- 

 tion gangs in the forest areas receive close attention from the provincial 

 authorities, but unfortunately the arrangements for the protection of 

 the forests along rights of way of railways already .in operation are far 

 from effective, which fact is only too well evidenced by the scenes of 

 desolation extending far and wide on either side of the Canadian 

 Pacific and Canadian Northern railways in western Ontario. 



All railways maintain section gangs at fixed intervals along their 

 lines whose duty it is to patrol and inspect the line daily to insure its 

 being in good repair. These parties as a rule travel on handcars of 

 some description which can be halted and removed from the tracks 

 wherever necessary. If some such system of patrolment for the pur- 

 pose of extinguishing incipient fires could be inaugurated throughout 

 the forest regions of the Province, there can be no doubt but that there 

 would immediately ensue a great diminution in the number of forest 

 fires. Nor would such a scheme appear to be impracticable. The lines 

 through these forest areas are in the majority of instances single track 

 and there is not an enormous press of traffic upon them. It would, of 



