42 THE WORK OF THE FOKEST DEPARTMENT IN INDIA. 



and the large numbers of wood-cutters, sawyers, carters, carri- 

 ers, raftsmen and others working in and near them, employment 

 on an extensive scale is provided to persons engaged in working 

 up the raw products. Among these latter may be mentioned 

 carpenters, wheel-wrights, coopers, boat-builders, tanners, rope- 

 makers, lac-manufacturers, basket-makers and many other 

 classes of skilled labourers. And yet with the further opening 

 up of the forests, the extension of systematic working, the wider 

 use of known products and the possible discovery of new pro- 

 ducts, a steady and extensive development of industries depend- 

 ent on the forests of India may be confidently anticipated in 

 the future. 



A detailed consideration of the many important forest in- 

 dustries would fill a large volume; all that can be done here is 

 to review shortly a few of them by way of example. 



(1) THE INDIAN PINE-RESIN INDUSTRY. 



The commercial exploitation of the resin of the Indian pines 

 serves a wide range of subsidiary industries. It provides rosin 

 for shellac making, soap manufactories, paper concerns, oil 

 cloth, linoleum, sealing wax, printing inks, electric insulation, 

 gramophone records, and wheel grease. And it also provides 

 turpentine, which is the chief thinner and solvent employed in 

 the paint and varnish trades, a mordant in print goods manufac- 

 ture, the basis of synthetic camphor, and an ingredient of boot- 

 polishes, embrocations and liniments. This field is wide enough 

 in peace time, but is considerably expanded in war time by the 

 rosin used in " setting " shrapnel bullets in shells. 



Of the world's trade in rosin and turpentine, or " naval 

 stores," the United States of America command about 80 per 

 cent, of the output, France coming second with some 15 per cent, 

 and the rest of the world taking the remaining 5 per cent. 



It is now well over a quarter of a century since forest 

 officers in the North- West of India began to realise the poten- 

 tialities of the wide pine belt along the foot hills and lower 

 slopes of the Himalaya. Many of them being French-trained,, 

 it was not surprising that the splendidly organized tapping; 



