METHODS OF FOREST POLICY. 237 



factory, yet by no means as efficient, as state in- 

 stitutions could make them. If, as is the case 

 with some of our western state universities, the 

 state provides the means of supporting the insti- 

 tution by a certain proportion of the tax rate in- 

 dependent of poHtical changes, the institution is 

 relieved of the necessity of keeping up the compe- 

 tition for favor, which disadvantageously besets 

 most of our private institutions of learning, and is 

 destructive to the competition for scholarship and 

 true scientific efficiency. 



A state institution, thus well endowed and inde- 

 pendent of numbers and of undesirable rivalry, 

 can at least promote efficiency with a freer hand. 

 Charity is generally conceded to be undesirable 

 where it can be avoided, and in educational matters 

 the interest of the community ought to be sufficiently 

 well recognized to repudiate support by charity. 



In the old countries the educational function of 

 the state is so well established as to have almost 

 eradicated private schools, except in certain special- 

 ties and primary institutions. 



The forestry schools of Germany, all of which are 

 now state institutions, originated, however, in private 

 undertakings, the so-called " master schools," when 

 a practitioner assembled around him young men 

 and taught them all he knew. Such schools arose 

 in large numbers during the last half of the eigh- 

 teenth century, — the first in 1763 in the Harz 

 Mountains, — but were usually of short duration. 



