FELLING BY ROTATION OF AREA. gi 



a series of annual blocks, it would hardly be pos- 

 sible at any future time to effect a further subdivi- 

 sion, especially if the blocks were situated in the 

 order of their numbers ; but the difficulty would be 

 trifling if there were a fortuitous irregularity in 

 the position of the blocks with relation to their 

 numbers, which would render it possible to divide 

 the division into two equal parts, in each of 

 which there would be a corresponding number of 

 blocks of all ages ; but if the blocks follow each 

 other in the order in which they come to the axe, 

 we might not be able to cut the division into two 

 parts without getting all timber above middle age 

 in the one part, and all below middle age in the 

 other. This objection does not hold in a forest 

 worked on the system of felling by selection; such 

 a forest, however subdivided, would still have trees 

 of all ages in each subdivision. 



Recurring to the system of felling by rotation of 

 area, if the period of rotation were fixed at a hun- 

 dred years, each forest or primary division would 

 be divided into a hundred blocks, and if planting 

 were resorted to for reproduction, one block would 

 be felled every year ; and necessarily, after the 

 first rotation, each block would come to the axe 

 at an uniform age of a hundred years ; and if in 

 the course of the rotation one or more blocks were 

 laid low, or so damaged as materially to affect the 



