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^started, everything will burn up, the green wood with the sap running out, and the green 

 deaves too, not only those of fir-trees, but of every hard-wood tree. As you throw in 

 Tthe branches the whole of the green leaves upon them catch fire simultaneously with a 

 isudden flash, and burn up with a crackling sound as if they had been steeped in 

 grease. 



" I have often done it, frequently in wet weather. We get rid immediately of all 

 light, inflammable material, from which the greatest danger of bush firss is to be appre- 

 hended ; the larger branches and trunks of trees, if you must burn them (which you 

 ought not) present little danger of fire in dealing with them. When you get inconve- 

 niently distant from your first fire, you light a second one and let your first one burn out ; 

 it is remarkable that those fires generally burn down to the ground more thoroughly than 

 the carefully constructed piles that have been drying up for a whole year. 



" Increased safety fro n fires is not the only advantage that would accrue to the 

 settlers from the adoption of this mode of clearing wood lands. Take them as a whole, 

 for the sake of comparing then», and this mode does not give more work than that now in 

 use. True, you have got to convey the stufi you intend burning a little further, because 

 one single fire, continued and replenished for some hours, will dispose of as much stuff as 

 would have made one or two dozen average piles, but then, think of the advantage of 

 having got all that rubbish out of the way at once, instead of having it to cumber the 

 ground until next year, when perhaps the season will be too rainy for burning, or so dry 

 that you will run the risk of setting fire to your own farm and the whole surrounding 

 country. As the work is now done, even in a small clearing, no settler can keep all his 

 fires under absolute control ; he is obliged to wait for dry weather, and then he has got 

 twenty, thirty and more fires going on at once. A sudden gust of wind, which is often 

 produced by the intensity of the fire itself in the stillest weather, and off the fire goes, ' 

 reaches the fire close by, and meets there with such encouragement as to get very soon 

 beyond human control. 



" As a further precaution against the danger to the forest arising from the clearing 

 of lands by fire, I would recommend that the Government should confine the settlements, 

 as much as possible, to the hardwood lands, of which there are large tracts still available. 

 ' As a general rule (to quote the words of Mr. Allan Gilmour in answer to questions of 

 a Committee of the House of Assembly of Quebec) it is well known that they are of 

 much better quality for farming purposes, than those covered to any great extent with 

 pine, while they are at the same time much more easily cleared, and will give, as a first 

 crop, a good return, in thg shape of pot or pearl ashes from the burnt timber, should the 

 parties clearing the land choose to make them — a benefit which cannot be had from pine 

 burnt in the process of clearing.' 



Mr. Joly recommends also, "Such a study of our unsettled lands as would 

 eifable them to be classified under two distinct heads — lands fit for agriculture, to which 

 the settlers ought to be sent, and lands unfit for agriculture, from which the settlers 

 ought to be kept away, for their own sake as well as for the public good." 



I should rather underbrush in the way Mr. Joly proposes than in any other, as I am 

 certain that it would injure the humus of the soil far less than the ordinary way. -In my 

 clearing days, I frequently thought of trying the plan for this reason, but never actually 

 made the experiment. It may be remarked that the reason. why the settler lik"sto leave 

 his brush piles lying everywhere till his chopping is done is, that he may then, after it 

 dries in the spring, set fire to all together, which often burns up many of the logs and 

 saves him much logging. Mr. Joly's plan, however, offers many advantages, and I do not 

 know whether, so great is the danger of fire under the old system, it would not be well 

 to render his plan of clearing compulsory. 



Speaking of the danger of fire from lumbermen and others, Mr. Joly says ; 



" Lumbermen cannot set fire to the forests in winter, while carrying on all the ope- 

 rations necessary for the cutting, squaring, and hauling of the timber ; the danger only 



