HIGH FOREST. 23 



year, and in felling the trees one by one, or in small 

 groups, here and there, as they become exploitable 

 or begin to decay. This method was mostly employed 

 in mountainous country, and especially in coniferous 

 forests. 



2. The method known as " tire et aire" which 

 became generally adopted in France under the terms 

 of the Eoyal Statute of 1669. In this method equal 

 areas of forest were cut over successively in the order 

 in which they followed each other on the ground, 

 a fixed number of trees were reserved per acre, and 

 the young crops that came up were left to themselves 

 and grew on untouched for the whole length of the 

 rotation adopted. 



3. The method of thinnings, which is intended to 

 obviate the defects of the two previous methods, and 

 is founded directly on certain facts in nature. These 

 facts relate to the conditions under which seeds ger- 

 minate, to the requirements of the young plants 

 during the first few years of their existence, and also 

 to the phenomena which are observed in the growth 

 and development of homogeneous crops left to them- 

 selves. 



It would perhaps be more logical to study these 

 three methods of treatment in the order in which 

 they have been given above, but the importance of 

 the method of thinnings claims for it the first place 

 in this manual. 



