1 6 FORESTRY I.V FRANrCU. 



FRANCE. 



REPORT OF CONSUL MASON, OF MARSEILLES* 



THE general destruction of forests which has entailed such serious conse- 

 quences in Southeastern France may be attributed to two general causes. 

 The first of these is the privilege " of pasturage and passage " that has been 

 vouchsafed for many centuries to the flocks and herds of the peasantry, which 

 are permitted to range freely upon all unclosed lands belonging to the com- 

 munes and the state. The summers of Provence are long and dry, and the 

 effect of continuous grazing has been to denude thin, poor soil of the hills 

 and mountain slopes of grass and herbage to such an extent that the roots 

 were either killed by the drouth and heat or were thrown out of the loosened 

 earth by subsequent freezing and thawing. As a consequence the soil of 

 many thousand acres of high pasture land has been washed away by the vio- 

 lent vernal and autumnal rains, leaving even the roots of trees so exposed that 

 they, in turn, were swept down by sudden floods and the violent winds that 

 prevail in this country. Large areas of forest were thus destroyed. 



The second cause has been the improvident and short-sighted interference 

 of man with the course of nature. One effect of the French Revolution was 

 to divide the land throughout a large part of France among a greatly increased 

 number of small peasant proprietors. They were poor, and compelled by 

 circumstances to utilize every resource. If the few acres of a peasant were 

 covered with forest he cut the trees away for the double reason that the tim- 

 ber was valuable and he needed the land for pasture. It was only after the 

 trees were gone that he learned that the destruction of the forest entailed the 

 ruin of the pasturage that grew beneath its protecting boughs. The conse- 

 quences have been disastrous throughout nearly the whole mountain region of 

 Southeastern France. Hundred of thousands of acres of upland have become 

 arid and barren wastes of plutonic earth, seamed by rugged chasms and gul- 

 lies, which in the rainy season pour down torrents of mud and stones upon 

 the fertile lands below and fill the streams with sudden floods that devastate 

 the valleys from mountain to sea. 



To resist this serious and constantly growing retribution, the French Gov- 

 ernment nearly seventy years ago began a system of forest supervision, fol- 



* As boeh the forestry schools in France are loaned in deparlmLnu remote from this district, I have stated 

 simply the character and scope of each school, leaving its course of study to be explained in detail by the 

 Consuls in whose districts the schools are respectively located. 



Similarly, the National Code of Laws which regulates forest culture and preservation throughout France is 

 left, in accordance with your instructions, to be transmitted by the Consul-General. 



The statistics of forest area in the several departments, as given on the following page, are official and 

 trustworthy, ^Jut are not as recent as could be wished, being based upon the returns of 1878, 1 have applied 

 to the Central Forestry Bureau at Paris, for similar statistics corrected to date, and if these can be obtained a 

 revised table of areas will be forwarded to the Department to replace the one now submitted, and which will 

 embody the latest figures that are accessible in this district. 



