THE PERIOD FROM 1878 TO 1891 65 



ber was cut, describing the land carefully and stating the evidence 

 upon which it was claimed to be mineral, etc. The manager was for- 

 bidden to sell any timber or lumber without taking from the purchaser 

 a written agreement that it would not be used except for the purposes 

 allowed by the act. Every purchaser was required to file a certificate 

 under oath that he was purchasing the timber or lumber exclusively 

 for his own use, and for the purposes enumerated. To make enforce- 

 ment easier, the books, files, and records of the mill men were required 

 to be open to the inspection of the officers and agents of the depart- 

 ment; while, to prevent waste and fire destruction, mill owners were 

 required to utilize all of each tree that could profitably be used, and 

 to remove the tops and brush. 



EVIL EFFECTS 



Unfortunately, the enforcement of these regulations was generally 

 very lax. A force of from fifteen to fifty-five special agents^^ could not 

 protect several hundred million acres of timber land, even when the 

 administration favored law enforcement, and in years when the admin- 

 istration did not favor that policy, very little could be expected. 

 Wealthy companies employed large forces of men to cut and remove 

 the timber, little if any attention being paid to the character of the 

 land, or to the size of the trees. Millions of dollars worth of timber was 

 reported to have been used in the Comstock mines between 1870 and 

 1893, some of it taken under the provisions of the Free Timber Act. 

 In 1887, suit was pending against one man in Colorado for 39,000 

 cords of wood alleged to have been cut from non-mineral lands. Timber 

 was taken, not only by lumbermen and by mining companies, but by 

 smelting companies, which found charcoal combined with coke a 

 quicker means of smelting than coke alone, and cleared vast tracts, 

 sometimes, it is stated, burning over large tracts in order to get the 

 dead timber, and then selling charcoal in the public market. Along the 

 Colorado Midland Railway, long stretches of mountainsides were 

 cleared of their forests, and later the charcoal kilns in the vicinity 

 were deserted because of the exhaustion of the supply of wood.^* 



13 Reports, Sec. of Int., 1879, 26; 1890, 80. 



i* Report, Land Office, 1888, 54: Forestry Division, Bui. 2, 1889: Proceedings, 

 Am. Forestry Assoc, 1891-92-93, 132: Report, Sec. of Int., 1887, 566, 567: Arbori- 

 culture, Mar. 3, 1903, 91-93: Bird, "A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains," 226. In 



