14 THE FORESTS OP PRANCE. 



the third Duplessis-Bouleau. They are all equally comp- 

 trollers-general. There are two receivers-general of woods, 

 and there are reckoned thirteen maitrises, or divisions, 

 each under a forest-master, viz. : — 



TOURS. 



' In this maUrise there is but one forest-master and a 

 king's attorney, or procureur de roi. There is, moreover, 

 no wood of which any use can be made ; the only one 

 which appears is that of the park of Plessis, which is of 

 very limited extent, badly planted, and beginning to 

 decline. 



AMBOISE. 



' There is no forest-master ; the lieutenant is the priest, 

 and the procureur de roi is no great things. Of woods, 

 there is only the Forest of Amboise divided into three 

 cantons : that called the High, that called the Low, and 

 that called the Middle Canton. The Low Canton is a 

 wretched coppice-wood on wretched ground, and is devoid 

 of baliveaux, or standards reserved for the re-seeding of 

 the wood; the Middle Canton is a young timber forest, 

 well conditioned, where, for ordinary sales they have given 

 up seven arpents or acres for exploitation by Furetage or 

 Jardinage ; in the High Canton there still remains a little 

 coppice, which might be turned to profit if it were well 

 conserved. 



' But the licence taken here is so great, and the ofBcers 

 do their work so badly, that all the inhabitants of the 

 environs send thither an immense number of cattle : and 

 more, they come themselves every day, to the number of 

 three hundred and more, with carts and beasts which they 

 fetch from people belonging to Chinon, Azay, Rivarennes, 

 and other places ; and the officers on their part pillage the 

 forest and despoil it. It is impossible to see the extent of 

 the greater depredations. Those who are most accused 

 are the Bishop of Nantes, the monks of Turpenay, and M. 

 de Vass^. There are four arrant guards bound to see to 

 the conservation of the forest, who, by themselves and 



