248 Sweden. 
In Lapland the entire forest area used to belong to the 
State, but in order to attract settlers these were given 
forest property for their own use, from 10 to 100 times 
the area which they had cleared. This forest area the 
settlers disposed of to wood merchants (lumbermen), 
similar to the usage on the Pacific Coast, until the law 
of 1873 intervened, restricting the settlers to the usu- 
fruct alone, the government taking charge of the cutting 
of wood for sale and limiting the cut to a diameter of 
8 inch at 16 feet from the base. 
This interference with what was supposed to be pri- 
vate rights seems to have been resented and has led to 
wasteful practices, in the absence of a sufficient force of 
forest guards. Nevertheless the law was extended to 
Westerbotten in 1882. 
. In other provinces, Wermland, Gestrikland, etc., the 
government vested in the owners of ironworks the right 
to supply themselves with charcoal from State forests. 
But about the middle of the 19th century, when owing 
to railroad development in other parts, some of the iron- 
works became unremunerative and were abandoned, their 
owners continued to hold on to the forest privileges and 
by and by exercised them by cutting and sawing lum- 
ber for sale, or even by selling the forest areas as if they 
were their properties; and in this way these properties 
changed hands until suddenly the government began to 
challenge titles, and commenced litigation about 1896. 
Grants of certain log cutting privileges on government 
lands were also made to sawmills in past times, usually 
by allowing sawmillers to cut a certain number of logs 
annually at a very low price. In 1870 these grants, 
which were very lucrative, were modified by substituting 
