American Forest Congress 25 



lar friend of the French (he ended badly, you know), 

 paid us, in one of his essays, this half-hearted com- 

 pliment: "The French are wiser than they seem." 

 Well, such as it is, I accept his saying ; to have wisdom 

 is the thing, and it little imports whether it is apparent 

 or concealed. Roots are not visible, and you know, 

 you foresters, that it is the root that feeds. 



Our policy in the matter of forests is a time-honored 

 one. Like the rest of the inhabitants of our land, they 

 have their own code of laws, the "Code forestier," 

 framed and issued in 1827, itself, in its main lines, an 

 adaptation of Colbert's famous ordinance of 1669, 

 which ordinance, in its turn, reproduced other laws, 

 some dating back from the time of Charles-the-Wise, 

 fourteenth century. 



We were early struck by the necessity of preserving 

 forests, and more and more so as we acquired a better 

 knowledge of the use and wants of these friends of 

 man. We have a National School of Forestry at 

 Nancy, where the sound principles of forestry are 

 taught. The practical importance of this teaching is 

 testified to by so many foreign students whom we are 

 happy to welcome there, some coming from America 

 — one, an eminent one, whom I would name, if he was 

 not so near me on this platform (Mr. Pinchot). 



Our forests have not only a code, but an army of 

 their own, an army of six thousand men, foresters, 

 rangers and keepers — a real army, submitted to mili- 

 tary discipline, so much so that in time of war this 

 troop is transferred from the Ministry of Agriculture, 

 where all the forestry services are centered, to the 

 Department of War. 



Several laws have been passed since the code was 

 promulgated, not at all to relax its rules, but to make 

 them more practical and efficient. In i860 a law was 



