1266 



Canadian Forestry Journal, August, 1917 



way to please a man than by talking 

 about the thing he is interested in at 

 that particular moment). During 

 the conversation he glances arrumd as 

 if looking for smoke .-remember the 

 idea is to get the fisherman's mind 

 centred on smoke, and smoke means 

 fire). After a while he says, "Well, 

 I guess I will have to be getting on, 

 pretty bad time for fire?' ^ The 

 fisherman then probably says seme- 

 thing such as "Had many this yeai?" 

 or 'Has there been much damage 

 done around here?" This gives the 

 Forest officer the opening he is look- 

 ing for, and he says, "No, not sc far. 

 Have been mighty lucky in having 

 'old timers' around who realize the 

 damage done by fires and are careful. 

 You can spot them every time. Now, 

 I can see you are far from a green one 

 in the woods from the way you handle 

 your rod and line," or anything like 

 that to flatter him. If he is an "old 

 timer" he will admire your powers of 

 observation: if he is not, he will be 

 tickled to death to think that a 

 Ranger, who is supposed to be the 

 best of woodsmen, could not spot him, 

 and his chest will bulge out consider- 

 ably. In either case the Ranger has 

 pleased him, and the chances are one 

 hundred to one he will have no trouble 

 with that man starting a fire. On the 

 other hand, suppose" the fisherman 

 does not give him an opening: in that 

 case, the Ranger stops and says, 

 "By the way, did yoii see any camp 

 fires coming down the river?" The 

 fisherman says "No." Then the 

 Ranger, "I certainly would appreciate 

 it if you would put out any you see 

 burning. We have some people who 

 come up here who are not used to the 

 woods, and naturally do not realize 

 the importance of putting out their 

 fires or that a little spark from a' 

 cigarette or match is very dangerous." 

 The Ranger has now warned the 

 fisherman by pretending to be worried 

 about others, and at the same time 

 pleased him by pretending to think 

 the chances of his being so careless are 

 so remote that it is unnecessary to 

 warn him. The same mode of pro- 

 cedure applies to hunters and camp- 

 ers. The Ranger can always bring 



the conversation around to his work, 

 and, by a little tact and politeness, go 

 away resting assured of the fisher- 

 man's, hunter's, or camper's co- 

 operation. 



Suppose he has come on to some 

 campers: he walks in, not forgetting 

 to be looking for smoke, and after the 

 usual day's salutation sits down. After 

 talking about things in general, he 

 gradually brings the conversation 

 around to cooking in the open. Most 

 of them will have some opinion as to 

 the best way. Of course, he will be 

 supposed to give his ideas on the 

 suijject. He might say something 

 like this: "Personally, I think a stone 

 fireplace is the best. It makes a 

 cracking place to cook on fall the 

 time he is showing them how to make 

 one), and if you bring along apiece 

 of sheet iron to lay on the stones you 

 will have a regular stove, or should you 

 forget the sheet iron (the chances are 

 they have'none with them this time), 

 you can easily make the fireplace 

 narrow enough to rest your frying 

 pans on the stones, and then, too,- a 

 fire of this kind is not so apt to start 

 a forest fire." Then he has the 

 conversation started on forest fires, 

 having told them of the fireplaces, 

 which is important. He now has them 

 in a good state of mind, and their 

 attention his, and he can tell them 

 lots which ordinarily would go in one 

 ear and out the other. I personally 

 have tried these ways of inciting the 

 interest of the users of the National 

 Forests, and found they never failed 

 to bring good results. 



The Manager of Eastern Lands of 

 the Canadian Northern Railway has 

 just returned from a trip through 

 Northern Ontario and says that he 

 believes that there are tributary t,o 

 the present railwavs and waterwavs 

 leading to them, 250,000,000 cords 

 of spruce pulpwood in Ontario and 

 350,000,000 cords in Quebec. He says 

 that it is useless to consider timber 

 north of the Transcontinental Rail- 

 way, as the rivers run north, and only 

 a small portion could be brought 'up- 

 stream by building dams which would 

 enable the wood to be towed back. 



