CHAPTER X. 



COPPICE OR NIEDERWALD. 



THE foregoing remarks refer especially to timber 1 

 forests, but all forests are not grown for timber. 

 If we were to convert all the waste lands in the 

 plains of India into forest in this generation, I 

 have no doubt that a century hence there would 

 be a vast improvement in the structure of native 

 houses and in their internal arrangements, and 

 that there would be men ready and willing to 

 extol the wisdom and foresight of their ancestors ; 

 but these appreciative murmurs, floating idly over 

 the graves of the deaf dead, would hardly com- 

 pensate them for the labours of which they never 

 reaped the reward. 



In the last chapter I deprecated the reduction 

 of the capabilities of our forests by premature 

 felling and inattention to reproduction ; for a very 

 proper sentiment lies at the bottom of the motive 

 which prompts us to leave those who come im- 

 mediately after us no occasion to tax us with 



