PEEFACE. 



It is only of late years that attention has been drawn to 

 the importance of conserving tropical forests. The ne- 

 cessity of organising a system, whereby it would be pos- 

 sible to control the clearing of indigenous forests, did not 

 at first present itself, especially as advancing civilisation 

 and an increasing population apparently indicated an op- 

 posite course of procedure. The question when viewed 

 simply in its physical relations, and the propriety of 

 clearing forest lands in order to enlarge the area of food- 

 producing soil, pointed perhaps as much to extensive 

 clearance as to vigilant conservancy. It is a fact, however, 

 that moderate and prudent clearing is quite compatible 

 with the maintenance of a profitable system of superin- 

 tendence. The matter of complaint was, that throughout 

 the Indian empire large and valuable forest tracts were 

 exposed to the careless rapacity of the native population, 

 and especially unscrupulous contractors and traders, who 

 cut and cleared them without reference to ultimate re- 

 sults, and who did so, moreover, without being in any 

 way under the control or regulation of authority. The 

 results of this wholesale and indiscriminate denudation 



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