Methods of Administration. rad 
for this severance was the increase of wood prices, which 
made a more technical management desirable, and also 
a decrease in the passion for the hunt. Still, although 
the forests, in Bavaria, were declared in 1780 to 1790 to 
be of more importance than the hunt, the two services 
being distinctly separated, the head of the hunt still 
ranked above the head of the forest service. 
In Prussia the professional men became early inde- 
pendent and influential, and by 1770 an organization 
had been perfected which excelled in thoroughness and 
simplicity. The salaries of the foresters consisted origi- 
nally mainly in a free house, use of land and pasture 
rights, their uniform, and incidental emoluments, like 
toll for the designation of timber, etc. Later, when a 
regular money management had been everywhere else 
introduced, the absence of a cash income and general 
poverty forced the foresters to steal and extort; and the 
bad reputation established in the last part of the 18th 
century, as well as the bad practice, persisted until the 
19th century. The lower grades in the service were ex- 
ceedingly ignorant, and their social position, conse- 
quently, very low. Their main business was, indeed, 
simple, and consisted in the booking of the cut, issuing 
permits for the removal and the sale of wood, and look- 
ing after police functions in the woods. Yet by 1781 
we find a regular planting plan submitted in the Prus- 
sian administration, and in 1787 a felling plan. 
The administration of justice against offenders in the 
forests was until the end of the 18th century in charge of 
the head foresters and only then was transferred to law 
officers. Theft of wood, as in olden days, was considered 
as a lesser offense than other thefts, except when the 
6 
