182 NEW BRUNSWICK FORESTRY CONVENTION 



in spruce and fir and this growth is what has caused the term pasture growth, 

 which denotes a tree with limbs to the ground, scrubby and of no practical 

 use for lumbering purposes on account of limbs and knots. These examples 

 which I have quoted will give you an idea of the difference between seeds 

 that have grown in the open, as seeds have to were they planted, and seeds 

 that have grown in a birch growth protected by nature. Therefore I claim 

 that in a given piece of land which has been burnt over allow the white birch 

 to grow and the fir and spruce to take root in their proper time and in 

 another piece of land adjoining set out the seeds and the seedlings and 

 nature will advance her growth of spruce and fir very much more rapidly 

 than the growth on the land adjoining and the lumber will be of some bene- 

 fit. Where on the other hand the stunted or pasture growth is practically 

 of no value. This leads me to the principal text of my argument which is 

 "let nature take its course in the Province of New Brunswick, plant her own 

 seeds and then let the Government assist nature by protecting the seeds that 

 she has embedded in the soil by a system of 



FOREST FIRE PROTECTION 



I might say in reference to the protection of our forests from fire that 

 our main trunk lines of railway have in the past few years interested them- 

 selves very extensively throughout the section with which I have been con- 

 nected and have done everything in their power to clear up their roads by 

 burning old sleepers, cutting bushes and burning them in the proper time. 

 This cannot be said of some of the branch lines throughout the Province 

 which you are all aware of. 1 am sure that one of the first steps that the 

 Government should take would be to insist that these railways conform with 

 the law in each and every particular by cleaning up their right of way and 

 having all the modern improvements on their smoke-stacks that will prevent 

 the throwing of fire into the adjoining land. This I think is a very import- 

 ant question and something that should not be neglected at all. 



We will next come to the matter of telephone and telegraph lines. 

 Where the country has been intersected in the past few years in even the 

 very remote districts by these telephone and telegraph lines they have made 

 a practice of cutting all the bushes that might interfere with their wires as 

 well as any that might interfere with their setting of poles. This brush is 

 allowed to remain along the highways and where there is generally an eleva- 

 tion on the banks they dry very rapidly and make a good tinder for people 

 driving along and throwing away cigars and matches. These companies 



