xl INTRODUCTION 



growing was excluded from the National Forests 

 before the boundaries were drawn, so far as this 

 was possible. Small tracts of agricultural land 

 within the Forests which could not be excluded are 

 opened to settlement under the Forest Homestead 

 Act of June 11, 1906. The amount of land, how- 

 ever, that is more valuable for agriculture than for 

 timber is trifling, because the greater part of the 

 valuable land was already settled before the Forests 

 were created. The few small patches that are left 

 inside of the National Forest boundaries are rap- 

 idly being classified and opened to entry for home- 

 steads. Much of the land apparently adapted for 

 agricultural purposes has a severe climate because 

 it lies at high altitudes and it is often remote from 

 roads, schools, villages, and markets. Therefore 

 the chance offered the prospective settler in the 

 immediate'vicinity of the Forests is far better than 

 in the Forests themselves. The Forest Service is 

 doing everything it can to encourage homesteaders 

 on the National Forests ; it wants them because they 

 help to report fires, help to fight fires, and in many 

 other ways assist the Forest officers. 



Permanent and Not Temporary Civilization Re- 

 sulted. Only those people who have been brought 



