73 



each containing abont 250 acres of sk\ forest, or a good deal more than the average. 

 When marked out on the groond the coupes wonld, we will suppose, be as follows :. — 



In selection worlsing, where the number of trees to be felled is prescribed, the 

 practice in India in the past has frequently been to study the results of the enu- 

 meration survey and to select areas capable oE furnishing the number of trees 

 required each year. Thus if the possibility were fixed at 2,000 trees, areas capable 

 of furnishing 2,000 trees would be selected to constitute the annual coupes. This 

 system is, however, open to objection in that the coupes are not permanent as they 

 Ought to be. They depend merely on the crop for the time being. At the next 

 felling lotation totally different annual coupes might have to be formed. A better 

 arrangement would, therefore, be to form permaneut compartments and 'then to 

 prescribe the fellings to be made in them. 



la coppice fellings, and other cases in which the possi- 

 bility is prescribed by area only, it is sometimes sought to 

 halance the production and to determine tlie area of the 

 coupes by processes more exact and scientific than those 

 described above. The production depends on what has been 

 called the quality of the locality, that is to say, on the 

 influence of the climate, aspect, soil, etc., and on the com- 

 position and density of the crop ; and it has been attempted, 

 by apsigning numerical co-efficients to each of these factors,, 

 to arrive at the result sought by means of mathematical 

 formulse. But such calculations, based on uncertain data, 

 are often misleading and occasionally land merely an 

 appearance of mathematical accuracy to estimates which 

 can be more correctly made by the exercise of a little 

 judgment and common sense. In the present state of our 

 knowledge of forestrj' in India they are as a rule entirely 

 out of place. 



