IN EEGAED TO EBBOISBMENT. 315 



of the inundations which come, with brief intervals, to desolate the valleys, 

 and after having established with true sagacity that the legislation of 1860 

 and 1864 was not responsible for this, — having given to the communes, 

 under the form of subventions, the amounts necessary for the consolidation 

 of the ground in ravines, — ^he concludes thus : " In view of the preceding 

 considerations, the Conservator asks to be authorised on his next official 

 circuit to promise to the communes interested that in future the State wiU 

 undertake the charge of all the works which the extinction of torrents im- 

 peratively demand, will indemnify in a just degree the communes which 

 shall have suffered thereby, and will aid those which shall labour seriously 

 at the reboisement of their mountains, on condition, that the communal lands 

 shall he placed under the regime of the Forest Administration." 



Of M. Sequinard's qualifications for his office as Conservator of Forests in 

 the High Alps the highest testimony is borne by those who know him. M. 

 Cezanne writes : " It is in the reports of M. Sequinard that we must look 

 for what may be called the philosophy of these operations. The extinction 

 of torrents is now a science, and its principles are deduced by M. Sequinard 

 in explicit and substantial theorems." 



" If," says M. Sequinard, " hoisement he the only means of extinguish- 

 ing torrents, it is not indispensable everywhere to fix and consolidate the 

 soil. It is nature that teaches us that, except in the oases of landslips and 

 rents and of some few spots, the ground will consolidate itself if it be pre*- 

 tected against the abuse of pasturage. So, the extinction of torrents re- 

 quires only (1) that the ravines be replanted with trees; (2) that the 

 pasturage be brought under regulation ; and (3) that the most exposed 

 spots, principally at the head of ravines, should be strengthened by partial 

 hoisemeut, trees of high growth being selected, so as to interfere as little as 

 possible with the use of the pasturage. 



" In ravines copsewood is of more effect than forest trees, from the diffi- 

 culty of getting out the produce ; high trees cover the soil only imper- 

 fectly, and they protect it less manifestly than young close coppice in a 

 state of brush. 



!* " Trees of small dimensions do tempt to trespass, but planted in horizontal 

 strips the wider apart the steeper the declivity, the young trees promote, 

 by the freshness and moisture which they maintain, the growth between the 

 strips of herbaceous plants, which after a few years may be depastured, 

 which is essential to the prosperity of a pastoral country. Moreover, in 

 almost all the localities the people feed the cattle in winter with the leaves 

 and young shoots cut green in the beginning of September. 



" Thus all interests are secured, (1) by replanting the ravines in alternate 

 strips with broad-leaved trees, which shoot readily again from the stump, and 

 which may be exploited in a brief rotation — ^which conditions are fulfilled 

 by acacias, elms, ashes, maples, and les bois Wanes, [a designation applied 

 conventionally to woods of inferior quality and of a soft contexture, 

 irrespective of colour, as alders, elders, poplars, and willows]. (2) By 

 gazonnement of the ground between the strips; but it is not enough to fill up 

 actual gaps, it is necessary to prevent the formation of others. 



" The abuse or immoderate use of pasturage being the main cause of dis- 

 integTation of the soil, it becomes of essential importance to regulate this. 

 It is a weighty and imperative duty for the communal proprietors to do 

 this. In point of fact, if the communes be proprietors, the successive genera- 

 tions have only the usufruct of the ground, and they should act the part of 



