coscLusiosr. 309 



then the iiTelative importance estimated, and the various special 

 conditions resulting therefrom and influencing the organisation of 

 the forest, combined and co-ordinated in the most advantageous 

 manner; in the next place, what is accessory and contingent 

 should he subordinated to what is principal and necessary; and, 

 lastlv, every point of detail should he taken into account to the 

 desirable extent and all useful improvements foreseen, arranged 

 for and accomplished as far as possible. This done, the result 

 will be an Organisation Project well suited to the given forest, 

 and, as a consequence, suited to that forest alone and to no other. 

 Hence, however small and simply constituted that forest may be, 

 its organisation will always be a complicated and difficult work. 



It may l<e effected in a thousand different ways, each of 

 these thousand wavs being a more or less good one. Without 

 going so lar as to seek the very best one of these thousand pos- 

 sible solutions of the problem before us, we ought at least to avoid 

 acting aiid deciding questions without any definite aim, and trust- 

 ing everything to mere chance, as we would, for instance, do if 

 we were to divide a high forest into 4 equal Blocks by means of 

 two straisht lines iiitersecting one another at right angles, or a 

 copse into 2-5 coupes by means of perfectly parallel Imes ; if, in 

 a word, we acted as if we had nothing more to do than trace out 

 a fe'sv lines on a piece of blank paper, instead of being obliged to 

 guide omselves by what we find on the ground. 



Suppose, to take an instance, there was a small wood of 

 250 acres, situated on level ground and composed of coppice crops 

 from 1 to 20 yards old. What could be more simple than this 

 forest, one would ask, and whit diflScnlties could its organisation 

 present ? Well then let us take for granted that the essential points 

 in this individual case are identical with those peculiar to the 

 whole region in general in which this forest is situated. Let us 

 also admit, for the sake of argument, that this wood ought to be 

 treated as a compound copse, that the Rotation to adopt should 

 be one of 30 years, and that the annual cuttings should pass over 

 equal area& But granting all this, is it not a &ct, firstly, that 

 the trees that are to be grown above the underwood are already 

 represented by more or less namerous standards all short in the 

 bole, and that this circumstance must be looked to and the pre- 



