126 THE FOREST LANDS OF FINLAND. 
mission being given to agriculturists to settle down within 
the boundaries of Crown forests where they may find land 
suitable for cultivation, and where an efficient supervision 
and protection of the forest is impracticable. Is it desir- 
able that such permission, in such circumstances, should 
be given? To the Commissioners it appeared that in 
regard to this the history of legislation is very instructive, 
showing that the practice has done nota little to develope 
the udal rights of absolute possession, where, under a 
climate so severe, a people possessing only vassal rights 
would not and could not have been expected to prosecute 
and maintain the cultivation of the soil. While field 
labourers in most of the countries of Europe lying further 
to the south, wrought the land on account of the sovereign 
or of some feudal lord, the agriculturist in the north 
became the possessor of the field which he himself had 
created by bringing it under cultivation. Through the influ- 
ence chiefly of the aristocracy, a change in the law was 
introduced. It had come to be considered that all land 
not under cultivation was considered Crown property, and 
under this assumption many sections were sowed by per- 
sons who had no right to the land, and who thereafter 
claimed the land as their own; and, in consequence of 
this, laws were adopted which confined and limited con- 
siderably the udalman’s right of holding and disposing of 
property. But the force of circumstances coerced legisla- 
tion on the subject, and secured legal recognition for udal 
rights, and for two centuries past the legislators have 
manifested a zeal altogether remarkable to secure the 
rights of possession to the settler dwelling upon Crown 
land, and to promote in every way possible, upon the most 
advantageous conditions, the acquisition of uda/man’s rights. 
And the Commissioners also considered that all who may 
go forth to settle in the Crown forests should be treated 
exceptionally, as the settlement there of a population not 
possessing an absolute right in the soil could not be other- 
wise than damaging to the wood, and detrimental to the 
land in every way. With such right they have a personal 
