NEW BRUNSWICK FORESTRY CONVENTION 19 



EL1HU STEWART, ESQ. 

 THE GENERAL NEED OF FOREST PRESERVATION 



When I began to consider that I had undertaken to say something on 

 so comprehensive a subject as that suggested by the title of my paper,. 

 'The General Need of Forest Preservation,'' one on which a whole book 

 could be written without exhausting the subject, I felt myself much in the 

 same position as the old German professor who after devoting his whole liiV 

 to the study of Greek nouns on his deathbed expressed regret that he had' 

 not confined himself to the dative case. 



1 shall therefore only attempt on this occasion to deal with the question 

 as it effects our own country. 



Canada has been blessed with many free gifts from the bounteous hand 

 of nature. We have the fish in the sea and in our inland lakes and rivers. 

 We have the wild animals of the chase, the fur bearing animals and wild 

 fowl in every part of the country. Minerals in untold and unknown abund- 

 ance. We have a vast area of fertile soil, the potentialities of which can 

 scarcely be imagined ; and last, but not least, we have the subject of my 

 text, the forests. 



Of all these gifts the forest is the freest. In the products of the soil it 

 is necessary to prepare the land and sow the seed before reaping the harvest. 

 In those of the mine it is generally necessary to expend considerable labor 

 in development work in search of what may or may not prove profitable in 

 the end. At best the miner is seeking for hidden treasure. The fisherman 

 casts his net into the sea with no certainty whether the return will be large 

 or small. 



How different with the lumberman ! The wealth of the forest lies open 

 before him. The crop is his without the sowing. He simply reaps where 

 nature has prepared the soil and cast the seed, and the centuries without his 

 aid or even care have nourished the plant and brought forth to his hand t 

 fully developed product. With him it is simply a matter of appropriate 

 which he usually has the Government as a partner. 



It is worthy of notice too that as only about one per cent, of the 

 contributing to tree growth is derived from the soil, trees do not deteriora 

 the land on which they grow and no rotation of crops is nece* 

 same varieties can be grown on the same soil for ages. 



