REPORT ON FORESTS. 295 



advantage with implements which are decidedly clumsy. And 

 then, too, all sorts of traditions and customs, rights and servi- 

 tudes have been handed down from generation to generation. 

 The poor peasant is often fettered by these inheritances, which 

 he joyfully leaves behind him when he enters a new and fresh 

 land. 



In parts of France forest fires are still quite common, even on 

 land which has been reforested, while in other parts wood is too 

 precious to burn even for fuel. In Italy lumber is one of the 

 scarcest of materials, although there are vast areas of waste-land 

 where wood could be raised to advantage, especially on the 

 bare mountain peaks. It is a land of few wood-workers and 

 many masons, where even the vine-props are often granite. * The 

 supply and demand are more local in Europe, and transportation 

 suffers from all sorts of hindrances. A board would pass 

 through more vicissitudes in going from Germany to Italy than 

 a bundle of shingles would in reaching New York from Oregon. 

 This is not so of water transportation, which is of course less 

 hampered by governmental interferences. 



In many districts in Europe the inhabitants depend upon turf 

 for fuel, which exists in almost exhaustless quantities in the 

 heathlands of the north, and even in Germany it is not uncom- 

 mon to see peasants drying cow-dung for the purpose. 



In parts of the Plain of northwestern Europe, under the peat, 

 have been found pine stumps and the stone implements of the 

 aborigines. Another page in its history is illustrated by oak 

 stumps, among which have been found bronze axes and other 

 implements. Here and there are beds of peat buried under the 

 sand, indicating that the soil has been shifted hither and thither 

 by the wind. It is generally believed, however, that the great 

 heathlands of northwestern Europe were never densely forested, 

 and that the trees existed in the form of groups here and there. 

 Such places were well suited to the nomadic pastoral stage 

 of man's existence. This, to a certain extent, still lingers in 

 the form of the shepherd tending his "snucken" or little black 

 sheep on these broad heath-covered plains. There, too, one 

 often sees a bee-keeper surrounded by many hives of little black 

 bees, which he moves from place to place for fresh pastures. 



* '* Forestiere " in Italian means a stranger — that is, a person from the forest. 



