FOREST EXPLOITATION ""A TIRE ET AIRE." 43 



of the effects of this system of exploitation on beech 

 timber forests, the restoration of which was not secured 

 either by a new growth of seedlings, or by new shoots 

 from the stumps left in the ground. 



And, finally, a grievance felt especially in the lesser 

 states in which the forest products constituted a great 

 part of the public revenue, began to call for a remedy. 

 This was the great and grievous inequalities which were 

 found to occur in the annual products obtained in carry- 

 ing out the system continuously and continually. There 

 was no unwillingness to retain and continue the orderly 

 regular exploitation of the forest of the importance of 

 this there was no question ; but it was felt to be absolutely 

 necessary that this should be so arranged as to secure 

 the most nearly perfect natural restoration of the forests 

 possible, and to furnish to the proprietors year by year 

 products pretty equal in quantity or in value. And this 

 was not done by the system which had been so admired 

 when first adopted. The system might admit of modifi- 

 cation, but the system pure and simple had proved a 

 failure. 



The forests of Europe had previously been extensively 

 subjected to Jardinage, and these forests, says M. Parade, 

 in the Historical Notices already referred to and of a 

 portion of which several of these statements may be con- 

 sidered a free translation presented standing crops of 

 most unequal denseness ; and standing crops without a well- 

 marked gradation of age, to which the system could not be 

 applied strictly without giving rise to many incoveniencies, 

 the most serious of which were these : (1) a great inequality 

 in the product of successive fellings on succeeding years on 

 succeeding sites, sites following side by side ; (2) consider- 

 able loss of increase proceeding not only from great differ- 

 ences in the soil, and in the denseness of the patches felled 

 in successive years; but also, and that more especially, 

 from the circumstance that some portions were necessarily 

 cut down while the trees were too young; while in 

 other portions many trees, and even entire plots, were 



