86 THE FOREST LANDS OF NORTHERN RUSSIA. 
brought by the Finns from the East; and in the volume 
named details are given in regard to the practice as fol- 
lowed in India, Burmah, and Ceylon, with discussions 
which have taken place in regard to the advantages of 
this mode of exploitation under different conditions. 
Both at Vosnesenya and at Petrozavodsk I heard of 
Sartage being practised frequently, and in different parts 
of the Government. 
On this subject Mr Judrue says :—‘ Reading the reports 
in the Government office of the Imperial Domaines, one is 
arrested involuntarily at a place which treats of unauthor- 
ised fellings carried on without leave or sanction. 
‘ According to these reports the population of the Govern- 
ment consists almost exclusively of those who were Crown 
serfs and their children, whose requirements of wood for 
fuel and building are sufficiently met by the allotments 
made to them annually from the forests; but these people 
for a long time back have been possessed with the idea 
that woods are of no pecuniary value, and they destroy 
them recklessly. When the annual allotment happens to 
be less than they think they require for building material 
—for it may be fancy erections which they do not require 
—they frequently go off to the woods and cut what they 
want without ever applying for permission to do so. And 
then the question comes up, Is it possible for the people 
to acquire at the present time any adequate idea of the 
necessity which there is for the conservation of the forests 
and the exploitation of them in a rational or scientific 
way? Let any one realise the case. Around all of these 
villages, even the smallest of them, there are forests of 
which the eye can see no end, they appear to be intermin- 
able; and there are depths of them to which the foot of 
man has never penetrated. The extent of these forests is 
such that to the peasantry they seem inexhaustible ; while, 
en the other hand, the severity of the climate, the unpro- 
ductiveness of the soil, and the poverty of the people are 
such as to seem to call upon every one to find out for 
himself with a hatchet in his hand any means of improving 
his. condition. 
