136 COMMISSION OF CONSERVATION 



conditions,' and my reply was, 'I consider it not "almost" but quite 

 criminal.' Worse horrors than last summer's fire are surely ahead, 

 if this sort of thing goes on." 



Scattered and badly regulated settlement makes it difficult to 

 control forest fires or to establish a system of inspection to enforce 

 regulations in respect of fire-guards. Where land is covered with 

 forest, or is of muskeg formation, special steps should be taken to 

 guard against indiscriminate selection of homesteads by settlers. 

 Settlement should be started from a railway centre and gradually 

 extended outwards, one good road at least being provided as expan- 

 sion takes place. Several townships should be opened up at one time, 

 but it should be required that a considerable percentage of these be 

 in occupation before others are placed on offer. 



The chief dangers of fires occur in regions where settlement 

 goes on in the immediate wake of logging operations. The carelessness 

 of the settler and the absence of roads are among the chief causes. 



These awful fire risks are not confined to British Columbia and 

 Ontario. The editor of Canadian Finance points out that most of 

 the new emigration to the Prairie Provinces is taking up lands in the 

 northern timbered areas, thereby duplicating the forest fire hazard 

 of the Ontario clay-belt. There is no need for these hazards being 

 permitted in any serious degree. Burning permits should be enforced 

 and land should be planned and developed in such a way as to secure 

 less scattered and more continuous settlement. 



FIRE SAFEGUARDS AND REGULATIONS 



Two safeguards are essential in dealing with fire, first, the pre- 

 vention of the starting of fires, and, second, the regulation of build- 

 ing construction and land development so as to minimize the possi- 

 bility of conflagration following a fire. 



It was noticeable in connection with the fire in Northern Ontario, 

 that the fire worked around cultivated land, leaving it almost un- 

 touched. It was a muskeg rather than a forest fire, and some effort 

 should be made to remove the danger by assisting in bringing more 

 land into cultivation as settlement proceeds. The building of good 

 roads, simultaneously with land settlement, and the provision of 

 village centres with local organizations, etc., are necessary to facili- 

 tate fire-fighting and to lessen danger to human life. 



The question of proper control of buildings by regulation, for 

 the purpose of fire prevention, must be taken up in Canada, in view 

 of the tremendous burden which has to be borne on account of the 



