NOTES. 423 



We may be safe from these figures to estimate the total 

 wood consumption for this one manufacture, paper, as round 

 2^ million cords, in addition to a certain amount of fuel wood 

 and an import, in spite of high tariff rates, of about 70,000 

 tons in excess of exports, worth between $2,000,000 and 

 $3,000,000. The wood value of this industry is then over 

 $30,000,000. 



Spruce constitutes about 76 per cent of all the wood used ; 

 in this amount, however, a considerable proportion of balsam 

 fir, and lately hemlock, is included ; 13 per cent is credited to 

 poplar, and 11 percent to other kinds. (For a brief but com- 

 prehensive description of the industry, see Report for 1890, 

 Division of Forestry, United States Department of Agricul- 

 ture.) 



To secure the round 2 million cords of spruce alone, almost 

 entirely cut in the northeastern states, at least 200,000 acres 

 of virgin mixed woods must be annually culled, and over 

 2 million acres in pure spruce stands would have to be main- 

 tained under good forestry management to secure this product 

 continuously. 



The growth of this industry in European countries is not 

 less remarkable, as may be seen from the fact that while in 

 1870 there were in Germany and Austria 92 wood pulp mills, 

 in 1890 there were 836 reported, and 911 in 1896. In Sweden 

 the export of wood pulp rose from 9003 tons in 1881 to 133,- 

 889 tons in 1895. In Germany the output of wood pulp con- 

 sumes now over 500,000 cords of wood per annum, and, in the 

 light of the anxieties which have lately been aroused in the 

 United States regarding the enormous increase in this drain 

 of our forest resources, it is significant to read the comment of 

 one of the leading foresters of Germany : " The advantage of 

 this industry for forest management is that the small sizes 

 of coniferous wood, which could formerly be sold only as fuel 

 wood at small prices or could not be sold at all, now have 

 found a ready market, and by this competition the wood prices, 

 especially for small wood, have risen. A profitable forest 



