178 FELLING AND CONVERSION. 



closely attaclicd to the forest. In such ilistricts there is 

 hardly any other industry but forestry ; and, even if other 

 employment could be found for the men, outside or within 

 the district, yet, provided they can earn the usual wages pre- 

 vailing in the locality, forest work is preferred to any other 

 industry by the greater part of the population, who have, as 

 it were, grown-up in mind and spirit with the forest. "Where, 

 on the contrary, in districts chiefly industrial or agricultural, 

 the work in the few existing forests can be done in a few 

 weeks' time, forest work is only an auxiliary to the usual 

 modes of occupation, the labourers have for it little taste or 

 skill, and can be induced to work only in a perfunctory manner. 

 The Remuneration aaid. other Conditions which the woodmen 

 receive from the forest owner should under all circumstances 

 be a fair equivalent for the amount of labour required, and 

 suffice for the support of a labourer and his family. It is, 

 therefore, clear that the more a forest owner can identify his 

 own interests with those of his woodmen, the more remunerative 

 will be the management of his forest. 



2. T>eiii(mtls on the Woodcut trr. 



People are apt to think that the demands made on a wood- 

 cutter may be satisfied by any labourer who can use the axe and 

 saw. This is indeed true in certain cases, but usually a certain 

 amount of skill, foresight, power of reflection and experience is 

 required, attainable only after prolonged labour in the forests, 

 which all workmen are not equally capable of acquiring, and 

 is not found in an equal degree in all forest countries or 

 districts. 



All industrial operations are more or less dependent on 

 the skill of the workmen employed, and the demands which 

 forestry make on labour form no exception to this rule. It is, 

 therefore, necessary to distinguish woodcutters of diirerent 

 grades of utility, and to distribute the work among them 

 according to their capability. "Whilst for work in high forest, 

 clear-cuttings, coppices or thinnings, the ordinary labour 

 force may suffice, natural regeneration-fellings and cutting of 

 standards over underwood demand much more skilful hands. 



