106 COLONIAL REPORTS MISCELLANEOUS. 



(c) Methods of protecting forests from the dangers mentioned 



above : 



In all civilized countries in which attention has been paid to 

 forestry it has been found necessary to introduce special laws for 

 the protection of the forests and the regulation of their manage- 

 ment. The application of such laws has, in the majority of 

 cases, been extended to private forests as well as to those belong- 

 ing to the State. 



The essence of all such legislation should be the recognition 

 by the law of forests " As pieces of property, as ' estates ' of a 

 peculiar kind." To quote further from the work of an eminent 

 authority on forest law, with reference to the above idea : 



"This is not a matter of words; it is an important and most 

 practical conception. Failure to grasp it in our colonies and 

 in other countries too has been the cause why so little progress 

 has been made in putting forest conservancy on a rational basis. 

 For if you realise the idea of a forest estate to be cared for as a 

 ' piece of property ' and protected by law you will also acknow- 

 ledge that a piece of property if it is to be either managed or 

 protected must be denned as to its limits, and all questions of 

 right and obligation arising within those limits must be settled. 

 If that is not done the forest is still in a fluid, uncrystallized 

 state ; it hardly deserves to be called ' property ' and consequently 

 any real conservancy will be unattainable. And it will at once 

 occur to you that if forests and other estates are to be recognized 

 as pieces of property in the above sense, the recognition can only 

 be made practical and operative by some action on the part of the 

 national legislature or central authority, whereby the State, the 

 person or body (as the case may be) who has become the owner, 

 is protected in his enjoyment within certain local limits, and 

 other persons are prevented from wrongful interference." 



In accordance with the above principle, if .any real progress 

 is to be made in forest conservancy in British "West Africa, the 

 first thing to do is to select the best areas and make them by 

 law (whether they belong to the paramount Government or to 

 native communities) pieces of property, to be managed as forests. 

 The law, in order to ensure this condition of affairs, has to provide 

 for five main heads of legal requirement and forest administra- 

 tion. They are: 



" I. It separates or distinguishes from the general area of 

 lands in the country, what are the forest estates or areas subject 

 to the law ; and it does this in several ways. 



"1. It regularly constitutes State or ' Reserved forest.' 

 " 2. The Indian Act creates a class of forest estates less 

 perfectly and regularly constituted, which it calls 'protected 

 forest.' The Madras and Burma laws do not recognize 

 this, but substitute certain general protective provisions for 

 all wooded, grazing, and waste lands which are at the dis- 

 posal of Government, but are not yet either made into 

 regular forests or given up to cultivation. 



" 3. The Indian and Burma Acts (not Madras) contemplate 

 the formation of village forests, forests for the benefit of 

 villages, but under a certain degree of State control. 



