PART II. 



THE FOEEST ORDINANCE OP 1669. 



CHAPTER I. 



No measure connected with the treatment of forests has 

 yet excited so widespread and prolonged beneficial influ- 

 ence as what has what has long been called — not in France 

 alone, but in other lands in which occasion has presented 

 itself for making mention of it — The Famous Forest 

 Ordinance of 1669, whereby it was sought to rectify the 

 malpractices ' previously prevalent in the forest manage- 

 ment of France. 



It should not be reckoned disparagement to say of it 

 that it was more perfect in appearance than in reality — 

 on paper than in the field^ — in the spring-tide of its 

 youth than a century later; and that the system of exploi- 

 tation it enjoined may be said to have now become 

 antiquated, and been superseded by the more excellent 

 way which has been more widely and more extensively 

 adopted, and gives better promise of permanence and 

 of good, though it is still only in the dew of its youth. 



The so-called Famous Forest Ordinance of 1 669 enjoined 

 exploitation, according to La Method d, tire et aire, in all 

 state forests, and, I may add, everywhere in France, in the 

 management of forests in regard to which the Government 

 had an unquestionable right to prescribe, such as those 

 held by ecclesiastics in virtue of their office ; by civil 

 corporations or communities, the members of which die, 



