112 Proceedings oe the 



timber owners and lumbermen can be instructed in this 

 particular and induced to practice timber management 

 in accordance with the plan advocated by trained for- 

 esters much will be accomplished in the direction of 

 prolonging existing timber supplies. But it should 

 be admitted by everybody that the money value of 

 standing timber will inevitably determine the disposi- 

 tion of it, except where it has been reserved by the 

 Government. 



If there has been any tardiness in recognizing the 

 necessity for forest regulation and reforestation it 

 should be understood that the forestry idea has been 

 slow in gaining ground even with a disinterested gen- 

 eral public, a fact chargeable neither to the lumbermen 

 nor to the forestry advocates. 



We have heard much of the "wasteful methods" of 

 the lumbermen, but in the early days of lumbering 

 there was no waste that was not necessary, or, rather, 

 no waste that was not more economical than to save. 

 No property owner can afford to spend dollars when 

 he will receive only cents in return. Under the condi- 

 tions, the waste in tree tops, tall stumps, thick slabs, 

 edgings, and trimmings and much sawdust was, from 

 a financial standpoint, no waste at all. The lumbermen 

 did with their property only what would yield the best 

 returns. 



To an industry established on such a basis there 

 came the advocate of forest preservation. Originally 

 — during the early agitation of the subject and up to 

 within fifteen or twenty years — forestry advocates 

 were manly of two classes, either sentimentalists or 

 technicists ; the latter being trained in the forest meth- 

 ods of the old European countries where conditions 

 were entirely different from those that obtained in 

 the United States. The former scolded or tearfully 

 implored, while the latter proposed the impossible. 



