MODERN FOREST ECONOMY, 117 
tries in which the forest economy is the most advanced, 
any difference in details being easily accounted for. 
Thus in France we find Sartage practised in special 
circumstances, while the forests of the country are man- 
aged in accordance with the most advanced forest science 
of the day; nor is there considered to be anything incon- 
gruous in this. In Finland we find that a forest management, 
which is in accordance with the most advanced forest 
science of the day, is being generally practised in the 
Crown forests throughout the country, while, subject to 
the restrictions which have been mentioned, Svedjande is 
practised, preferred, and justified in dense, extensive 
forests. The conditions of the two countries are different. 
The. improved forest economy of France dates from the 
issue of the celebrated Forest Ordinance of 1669, if 
not from a much earlier day. Compared with this, 
the improved forest economy of Finland is a thing of 
yesterday ! 
Finland, though erstwhile an independent country, was 
for a long time a province of Sweden, and it is now a 
province of Russia, possessing many privileges and well 
defined extensive powers of legislation and government. 
It was on 17th September 1809 that Finland was 
annexed to the dominions of Russia as a Grand Duchy, with 
the enjoyment of these privileges and of government under 
its own laws issued in accordance with its constitution. 
All the later improvements in forest economy have been 
made since that time; and it is under Russia that the forest 
economy of Finland has. attained to its present condition. 
This development has taken place in the course of the 
last five-and-twenty years. 
Till 1809 Finland was connected with Sweden, and up to 
that time the history and development .of the natural 
resources, and, to a very great extent, the laws of the two 
countries were the same. In regard to the former state of 
culture in the country, so far as forests are concerned, 
information upon which reliance may be placed may be 
found in Agardh’s Siatseconomisk Statistic afra Sverige, 3d 
Delen, Ist Hafiet. 
