92 THE FOREST LANDS OF FINLAND. 
1860-61, reports a great devastation in the Bedee Talooka, 
which had been occasioned by this practice of Koomri, 
and mention was subsequently made of dullee cultivation, 
which I conjecture ta be the destruction of forests for 
permanent agriculture, It was subsequently recommended 
that no Koomri or dullee cultivation should be made either 
on hill or on other land without express permission from 
the collector of the district; it was again enjoined that 
existing orders relating to dullee or Koomri cultivation 
should be scrupulously attended to, and that the village 
authorities should be held responsible for this being done ; 
and a hope that this would secure the forests from that 
destructive system was expressed by the Government, 
This was done in 1864. In the course of the same 
year the Secretary of State, in a dispatch to the Governor 
of Bombay, in Council, brought under their atttention a 
letter which had been addressed to him by an officer in 
the Bengal army, alleging that the prohibition of 
Koomaree had the effect of producing fever, An enquiry 
was instituted by the. Government at Bombay, the result 
of which satisfied the Government, both at home and in 
Bombay, that such was not the case. 
Up to a comparatively late time this subject is adverted 
to in the reports of the Indian Forest Administration, 
and special reports on the subject are not awanting; but 
it is chiefly in those of an earlier date that I find such 
discussions of it, as I consider it expedient to cite. 
In 1864 the effects of the practice on the health of the 
inhabitants of districts in which it prevailed, and the 
effects of stopping the practice upon the sanitary condi- 
tion of different districts, commanded the attention of 
many officials in different parts. The opinions advanced 
were very conflicting, so conflicting that, to cite many of 
those which I have before me, would do more to confuse 
than to enlighten a student of Forest Science, who was 
not prepared to investigate the matter thoroughly. The 
facts adduged seem to me to indicate that the injurious 
