80 THE LOG OF A TIMBER CRUISER 
th’ politicians; that’s with makes thim mad. An’ 
that’s the reason they’re hollerin’ their heads off 
about the turrible guv’ment regulations of Forests 
an’ how lovely t’would be if the states had thim. 
T’would so—but fer the politicians and their fren’s, 
not fer you and me. 
‘‘An’ much as they holler, an’ much as they’d like 
to git somethin’ on the Forest Service, ye never 
heard one av thim yet cha-a-rge any favrytism— 
ye never heard thim say that any offishul of the serv- 
ice give one man anathin’ ahead of another, unless 
he had a right to ut.’’ 
We applauded McGee’s speech heartily. Nor did 
it take us by surprise. For among the actual users 
of the Forest, the men earning their living by work- 
ing for it, the general feeling now is that the Forest 
Service administration is fair and just and in general 
conducive of much better conditions for the small 
man than the old laissez faire policy of competition 
and waste on range and in forest could ever be; that 
it would be a calamity to return to that condition and 
that it would be a régime only a little, if any, less 
disastrous if the forests were to be put into the 
control of the various states. For that would mean, 
in too many cases, into the hands of the state bosses. 
Before we left this camp the old miner bestowed 
upon us a wealth of facts regarding the mineral re- 
sources of the Black Range. He was optimistic as 
to future prospects. He showed us samples of ore 
that looked good, and seemed to think that it would 
