1012 AND FISHERIES COMMISSION. 149 



are concerned, it is not to be credited that such comparatively trifling 

 additional expenditure would materially affect the enterprises or act 

 in any way as a deterrent to their initiation. As, however, these ex- 

 penditures have not been demanded in the past, there would naturally 

 enough be some protest from the lines at present in operation, but it 

 must be remembered that the railroad development through the great 

 bulk of the provincial forest area is only now commencing to emerge 

 from its infancy, and that the issues at stake are truly vaist. If some 

 opposition will have to be encountered now to effect the introduction 

 of such a measure, in twenty years time that opposition will have im- 

 measurably increased, and if the opposition of to-day is allowed to pre- 

 vail, the probabilities are that, meanwhile, great stretches of Ontario's 

 fair and valuable forests will have been withered, shrivelled and de- 

 stroyed, owing to the very largely preventible incendiarism of the steam 

 engine. 



It has been pointed out in another section that one of the chief 

 causes of forest fires is the carelessness of prospectors, trappers, hunt- 

 ers, Indians and other individuals in the woods. Notices and warnings 

 as to the regulations may be and are posted up in the forests; efforts 

 may be and are made to hand personally to each individual entering or 

 in the woods copies of the regulations, and to administer to each a 

 verbal warning; but even the most careful man may make a slip, and 

 it may safely be said that the bulk of those whose occupations lead them 

 into the woods at some time or another will be careless in the matter of 

 a match, lighted tobacco, or even, perhaps, the cooking fire. Evidently 

 it is not possible closely to patrol the whole of the great forest areas of 

 the Province, or even those sections into which some numbers of men 

 penetrate, and consequently the individual himself has to be relied upon, 

 but, nevertheless, there remains the great necessity of getting organized 

 and intelligent effort to work on a fire before it has time to make much 

 headway, if the forests are to be saved from burning. 



In almost every region there are points from which a considerable 

 view of the surrounding country can be obtained. In New York and 

 other States it has been found highly effective to take advantage of 

 such sites for the erection of fire lookouts. Where, perhaps, tree-tops 

 impede the view, a rough tower of timber is constructed, and in any 

 case a detail of men is kept on watch, furnished with a large scale and 

 reliable map and with a good pair of field-glasses, and the station itself 

 is connected by telephone with other stations and with the fire superin- 

 tendent of the district, the men thus employed, from the superintendents 

 down to the rangers, having no other duties or occupations than those 

 of protecting the forests against fire. The advantages of such a system 

 are apparent. Great tracts of territory can be observed, and after but 

 little practice, with the aid of a good map and fields-glasses, the look- 

 out men can fairly accurately determine the location of any fire which 

 breaks out. The whole system being in direct speaking connection with 



