154 
WHAT FORESTRY HAS DONE. 
'The following extract is reprinted from Circular 140, Forest 
Service, U. S. Department of Agriculture. 
FRANCE. 
France has not quite 18 per cent, of forest — three-fifths of an 
acre per capita. This is enough to produce only one-third of 
the home demand. The country imports annually $30,000,000 
worth of wood, and pays $6,000,000 duty and $10,000,000 freight 
for it. This wood comes from Russia, Sweden, Norway, Aus- 
tria-Hungary, Germany, and America. Of the 23,500,000 acres 
of French forests the State owns 2,707,000, and the Departments 
and communes 3,472,000. Since 1827, when the first code was 
passed, the State and communal forests have been under manage- 
ment. The State forests yield a clear profit of $4,737,250 a year, 
or $1.75 per acre; $0.95 is spent for the management of each acre 
every year. 
The best managed State forests yield about 40 cubic feet per 
acre a year, which is low compared with the yield of some other 
European forests, such as those of Prussia, Saxony, or Wiirttem- 
berg. 
The great achievement of France in forestry has been the es- 
tablishment of protective forests where much destruction had 
been caused by floods and winds. From various causes large 
areas were cleared of forests toward the close of the eighteenth 
century, and only when it was too late was it realized that these 
lands were not fit for agriculture and should have been left in 
forest. To repair the mistake, a movement to reforest began in 
the nineteenth century. It was an exceedingly expensive mis- 
take. Down to the present time, encouraged by wise laws, the 
State, the communes, and private landowners have restored to 
forest over 2,500,000 acres, and so saved them from ruin. In 
addition, the resulting forests return an excellent revenue. 
Two-thirds of the torrents of Europe are in France. In the 
Alps, the Cevennes, and the Pyrenees mountains there are 1,462 
brooks and mountain streams which are considered dangerous. 
Nearly a million acres of mountain slopes are exposed to erosion 
by these streams, to say nothing of the flat land below. 
As far back as the sixteenth century there were local restric- 
tions against clearing mountain sides, enforced by fines, confisca- 
tion, and corporal punishment. In the main these prevented 
ruinous stripping of hillsides, but with the French Revolution 
these restrictions were swept aside and the mountains were 
cleared at such a rate that disastrous effects were felt within 
