“circles” in his district. The oberforstmeister 
for the canton of Ziirich is Herr Theodor 
Weber, who is now the president of the Swiss 
Forestry Association (Schweizerischer Forst- 
verein), an organization made up of profes- 
siopal foresters, forest landowners and others 
interested in forestry. This association pub- 
lishes a monthly journal, in a German and a 
French edition, and through its committees 
is an active force in forestry in Switzerland. 
It was the great good fortune of the writer to 
have Herr Weber accompany him to Winter- 
thur. The day spent in that forest was a 
highly profitable one. 
While on the subject of administrative or- 
ganization, a word may well be added con- 
cerning the other. cantons and the confedera- 
tion. Switzerland is divided politically into 22 
cantons, each of which preserves a large share 
of autonomy. Each, for instance, has its 
own forestry organization, all generally simi- 
lar to that of Ziirich, although differing in de- 
tails and in the titles borne by the foresters. 
The cantonal forest services are independ- 
ent of the federal government and of one 
another, much as are our own state forestry 
organizations. But there is this exception: 
Under the Swiss forest law areas that are re- 
quired to be kept under forest for protective 
purposes, as torrent and avalanche control, are 
declared to be “protection forests’’, and then 
come under the supervision of inspectors 
who make up the staff of the Forestry Bur- 
eau of the Confederation, that has its head- 
quarters at Berne. All work on these forests 
is, however, done co-operatively with the can- 
tonal foresters. The office at Berne also 
compiles and publishes statistics for all of 
the cantons. 
The Swiss Forest School is a federal insti- 
tution. It is located at Ziirich, where it 
forms a part of Ziirich University. Here also 
are the headquarters of the Forest Experi- 
ment Station, which under the able direction 
of Professor Dr. Arnold Engler, is making 
valuable contributions to the scientific side 
of forestry. 
THE COMMUNAL FOREST 
OF GRINDELWALD 
But this letter is supposed to deal with 
town and communal forests. There is one 
other Swiss example that deserves mention, 
the mountain forests of the commune of 
Grindelwald, in the forest district of Inter- 
laken, in the canton of Berne. Grindelwald, 
as every one knows, is a little town nestling 
in a high valley in the Bernese Oberland, un- 
der the shadow of the high peaks of the Wet- 
terhorn and of the Jungfrau. The commune 
is made up of sevén mountain villages, each 
of which has its forest. Three-fourths of the 
forest land in the valley belongs to the com- 
mune. From their location these forests all 
fall into the protection forest class. They 
are Managed under working plans, drawn up 
by one of the assistants in the district for- 
ester’s office and supervised and administered 
by the local ranger. No trees can be cut un- 
til they have been marxed by the ranger, and 
strict care is taken not to exceed the allowed 
annual limit. 
The interesting point is, however, the 
way in which the timber so cut is distributed 
among the people, for there is not enough to 
permit any to be shipped out of the valley. 
Applications for timber and wood may be 
made only by bona fide residents of the com- 
mune, landowners. They are divided into six 
classes. First served are those who want 
lumber for repairing the little cabins that 
shelter the cattle in the high pasture lands, 
or for the construction of new cabins. In 
local usage these mountain pastures are ‘‘the 
alps’’, not the mountain peaks as we norm- 
ally use the term. Second, comes wood for 
building and repairing fences on the moun- 
tain sides. Third, repairs to cattle stables in 
the valley. Fourth, repairs to houses in the 
valley. Fifth, lumber for new houses—which 
are usually put up by all the neighbors join- 
ing in a house raising ‘‘bee’’, just as used to 
be the custom in America, when the Ohio 
valley was still on the frontier. (Likewise 
the owner of the house sets up drinks for the 
crowd, the only payment, just as did our 
own worthy forbears.) 
When all these needs are served, if there 
is any wood left, the sixth-class applicant 
comes to be considered, the man who wants 
fuel. Often he does not get any, for the al- 
lowed cut has been exhausted; but he seldom 
goes cold, for almost every land owner has a 
little patch of private woodland and also the 
right to gather dry wood and branches in the 
communal forest. Of course all of this is on 
a very small scale and rather primitive as 
to methods—the lumber for the repairs to 
the alpine cabins has for instance all to be 
packed on men’s backs, up slopes where one 
plank makes a good load—but it serves to 
show the value of communal forests and the 
need of exercising the greatest care in their 
perpetuation. 
Another similar custom is the way in 
which grazing is regulated in the high moun- 
tain pastures. It goes by the amount of land: 
a Man owns in the valley. If he has one “ar- 
pent’”’ he may send up 8 sheep, or 8 goats, or 
1 cow. If he has but one half arpent 4 sheep 
or goats, and so on. Locally, it is said that 
a Man has so many hoofs, or toes, of land; a 
cow being classed as having 8 hoofs. The 
Mountain slopes are usually divided into 
three paddocks, the animals being allowed to 
proceed to the higher land as the summer 
season advances. By these regulations the 
pastures are never overstocked, nor subjected 
to the danger from erosion that would follow 
over-grazing. d 
: One point in the Swiss forest law regard- 
ing privately owned forest land may per- 
haps here be noted. In the federal enact- 
Ment that applies to all the cantons it is 
made specific and mandatory that the existing 
forest area of Switzerland shall not be re- 
duced. Consequently, when the private own- 
er of forest land cuts his forest he must 
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