ANCIENT AND MODERN FORESTRY 5 
hot, moist tracts densely covered with evergreen 
tropical jungle. These two form, indeed, one of 
the exceptional extremes which never meet. 
Before man could acquire his dominion over 
the beasts of the field, he had of course first of 
all to form his fields by clearance of the natural 
forests. And this is a process which we still 
can see in practical working in various parts of 
the world. The Canadian backwoodsman and 
the Australian squatter are doing in temperate 
regions much the same as the hill-tribes of 
thickly-wooded parts of India and Burma, in 
clearing away ‘the forest primeval’ for agri- 
cultural or pastoral occupation. It was ever 
thus, probably from long before the days when 
the Psalmist sang that ‘a man was famous 
according as he had lifted up axes upon the 
thick trees’; and it was thus also in England, 
no doubt, long before the historic epoch. 
During the early days of the historic period, 
when Caractacus and Boadicea vainly tried to 
resist the legions of Rome, Britain was densely 
wooded. Cesar, in his Commentaries, describes 
the ancient Britons as a true forest people, whose 
military tactics consisted in retreating hastily to 
