PROTECTION AGAINST MISUSE OF RIGHTS OR SERVITUDES. 225 



favours, or not infrequently in use and custom which, from not 

 being checked until the market value of the forest produce had 

 risen somewhat, in the lapse of years grew to have the legal 

 status of a prescriptive right. Or, on the other hand, in a great 

 many cases the ancestors of those, to whom only servitudes or a 

 certain restricted dominium utile now remains, were formerly the 

 actual owners in common of the woodlands, but gradually one or 

 more forged ahead in power and influence, and ultimately either 

 by consent or usurpation assumed for himself and his heirs the 

 dominium directum or ostensible possession of the land. 



It may easily be understood, with a little reflection, that under 

 certain circumstances the servitudes may be of greater value than 

 the benefits derivable from the nominal ownership of the soil, and 

 that, unless limits be assigned to them, they may ultimately 

 extinguish any benefits derivable from possession. 



The nature and the results of servitudes over forest land have 

 little practical interest for Britain, although those on the Con- 

 tinent are interesting, and all the more so as very few of the 

 State Forests of India, the selection and formation of which has 

 for the last 20 years occupied the full energy of the Indian Forest 

 Department, and will still take it many years of unremitting 

 labour, can be set apart without being burdened to a greater or 

 less extent by " rights or privileges" accorded with generosity, and 

 too often with a lavish hand, as far as concerns the existing popula- 

 tion in the vicinity, and its probable increase in the near future. 



The rights and privileges included under such servitudes over 

 woodland areas are of many kinds, varying of course with the 

 nature of the produce of the different localities. Among the 

 most frequent in the Crown forests of England and on the Con- 

 tinent of Europe are the following : 



1. Eights relating to Timber, for building purposes, trade- 



requirements, fuel, softwoods, dead wood, windfall, stumps, 

 brushwood. 



2. Rights relating to Minor Produce, dead foliage for litter, 



grazing, pasturage, pannage, tapping for resin, collection 

 of mast, collection of fern, turbary. 



3. Other Rights, quarrying, mining, right of way, right of 



transport by land and water. 



Such servitudes frequently debar the owner in possession from 

 utilising the land in the most economical way as regards choice 



