
on 
Now, I believe that our own brief experience confirms that of the va- 
rious HKuropean countries and is in full harmony with the @ priori de- 
duction drawn from a study of the problem, viz, that a wide and inten- 
sive care on the part of the Government is indispensable to insure the 
preservation of the necessary forests. As already shown, our Govern- 
ment has never taken it for granted that any branch of industry would 
flourish to the desirable extent if left to itself.. Much less likely is for- 
estry to flourish, if left to itself, than other branches. <A very short 
glance at the history of our forests is sufficient to show why they have 
been disappearing so rapidly. 
The farmer has cleared off, perhaps, as many acres as the lumberman, 
.it may be more; but he has cleared the ground for the purpose of cul- 
tivating it, and though it is undoubtedly true that in some localities he 
has pursued a short-sighted policy and cut off an excessive amount. of 
the forest, yet on the whole most of the clearing he has done has been 
of a character that has contributed to increase the total wealth, present 
and prospective, of the community. This can not be said to the same 
extent of the lumberman, who has often cleared the forests from ground 
which was really good for nothing but to grow forests. Until a very 
recent period it was possible to get possession of forest lands for a mere 
song. A company having once put up its mills, found it for its interest 
to use up the supply of material as soon as possible and then to change 
the location of its works. Such enterprises had little interest in the 
welfare of the region within which the mills were situated, for they did 
not expect to stay longer than was necessary to make use of the wood 
which was suitable for their purposes. They cared still less for the in- 
terests of the dwellers in the valleys of the water-courses which their 
policy was converting into entirely different sorts of streams. They 
hoped to make more money by cutting down the trees as rapidly as 
possible and then moving on than in any other way, and as it was money 
alone which they were after they did what promised to give them the 
biggest and quickest returns. From their stand-point it was all right, 
and just what everybody else in society would have doneif he had had 
the chance, but it was none the less ruinous to the interests of those 
who were affected by it. The feeling-of the injured had little chance, 
however, to concentrate itself against any one, as the aggressors were 
often far removed from the scene .of operations which affected them, 
and the injured were, moreover, ignorant of the true cause of ‘their 
losses. In a word, it is to the pecuniary interest of the lumberman to 
cut as fast as he can, since the more he cuts the more money he 
makes, and if the supply gives out he can move on to where there is 
plenty of it. What does he care even if the supply will come to an 
end in twenty or twenty five or fifty years?) That is a long way off, 
and after him the deluge. Now, I think that no one can doubt that it 
was a short-sighted policy for our States and the nation to be so free 
with their timber resources as to hand them over without control of 

