DfiCEMBER 1,1891.] THE TROWDAL A 0 R» 0 ULTURI 8 T, 
393 
FOEEST CONSEEVANCY. 
This is Mr. Broun’s first report as head ol the 
Forest Department, that is to say he has written 
it as Acting Conservator o< Forests, his appoint- 
ment requiring of coarse the confirmation of the 
Seoretnry of State, which may be taken for granted. 
But the report refers to a year when Mr. Broun 
wee etill only Deputy Conservator, for, when Colonel 
Clarke was compelled to go on sick leave, Mr, 
Broun was absent in India, and Papt. Walker as 
Senior Assistant Conservator, acted as Conservator 
fOr just the last week of 1800 Mr. Broun returning 
on Slst December, As a trained professional man, 
Mr. Broun writes a very detailed and elaborate 
report, which is largely oconpiod with imperfections 
of departmental organization, procedure, departmen- 
tal rules and forest laws. The amendment of the 
latter, it seems, is delayed until the appear 
anoe of a new edition of the Indian Forest 
Act, which will, of course, embody the results 
of the latovt and most extended experience 
of the moltitiidinens details of forestry and their 
bfar'ng on the irteres'a of agrioulturiste speoially, 
and the oommunity in general. At the nomraonoe. 
inent Mr. Broun very pronerly eipresseg his regret 
that the Government rules as regards half-pay 
for acting anpointmenta oonld not be relaxed in 
the ease of Pol. Clarke, who certainly contracted 
the fever which has affeot“d him SO seriously 
when enpaged in duties conneote 1 with the Forest 
Department.. T.'ke every other head of a department 
Mr. Breun wants more money than Government 
is willing or a'de to crant ; and with much reason, 
a plea ia out in for (he forest ofBoers, 
that, subjected n.s they are to special ex. 
posnre, they should not only roosivo better 
pay, but, as regards pensions, bo put on 
an equal footing with the members of the P. W. D. 
A protest is entered against the humiliating 
rule tliat a forest ofiiner cannot eut a stick of 
wood without the permission of the Government 
Agent. We can understand due powers being 
reserved to administrative offiflors, hut surely this 
ia compatible with vesting farest offioers with 
desoretion such as native boadmen exercise. 
Mr. Huddleston was employed daring a portion of 
the past year in reporling on the forest To*ource8 
of the Trincomaleo district, and his initiatory 
report gives a striking impression o’ the devas 
toting resnlta of the system, or rather ntter 
absence of system, which prevailed about 
forty years ago, when, without any adequate 
return to Government, there was a oontinuous 
export from Trinoomalee, for years in snooession, 
of valuable ebony, eatinwood, b.almilla and other 
timbers of which the Government forests were 
denuded for the advantage of individual traders. 
In regard to a large portion ol those eastern 
forests, the attention of the forest oflioers 
must for many years bo devoted to the not im- 
mediately profitable hnt absolutely necessary work 
ol t noouraging by every possible means the process 
of uatu'iv' reproduction: lotting the light have 
access to llio seeds which arc plentifully distri- 
buted in tlio soil and provontiug the acoess of 
destructive animals and fires, as well as destruc- 
tive natives who never hesitate to out 
down saplings of the finest spooirs of timber 
trees for fence stioks and similar us < In one 
part of the report it U stated that Yaluable 
CO 
saplings arg recklessly cut by the natives, not onl7 
for their own use but for sale to Indian dealers 1 
The remedy of oourse is to demaroato and Be*i 
apart village forests for supplies of timber and 
obena cultivation. That onoe done, trespassers on 
Government forests and forest reserves ought to be 
rigorously prosecuted. Mr. Broun oomplains of 
the slowness of the processee of survey and de- 
marcation ol boundaries, and protests against 
forest snrveys being eomplieated, as in Sabara- 
gamuwa, with the settlement of village olaims. 
Mr. Broun also very properly ineiats on the 
forest offloors qualifying theraselvoa to execute 
BUTveys of a nature from slight sketches to more da- 
borate plans. A fully qualified forest ofiioer, indeed, 
must be a man of great and varied acoomplisb- 
ments ; a botanist with a keen eye for peculiarities 
ol soil and climate, a judge of the qualities of 
growing timber and an adept in its treatment 
when growing and after felling, a competent surveyor 
and well acquainted with native languages and 
customs, — especially the communal laws. How 
valuable the knowledge acquired by experience oan 
be is illustrated by the bistorv of pain timber for 
railway sleeper pnrposea. This timber baa been 
rejected bsoause of oraoks, the result of felling 
when green, but an experiment in ringing the trees 
and leaving them standing for a year subscqnently 
has obviated thie difUculty. We are glad to notice 
that teak at Puttalara and mahogany at Jaffna have 
been fully suecessful ; and it is quite clear that 
the latter, the moat valuable perhaps ol oabinet 
and struotural timbers, ebonld be extensively oul. 
tivatod in the dry and arid regions ol Oeylon. If 
in 1843 a hnndred thousand mahogany trees, 
instead of four, had been suacessfully planted at 
Jaffna, the timber would now or a few years 
hence realize large wealth for the colony. From 
mesauroroenta given of trees planted at different 
periods between 1843 and 188.5, we learn that the 
mean girth at breast height of 4 trees planted in 
1843 is 8 feet 7 inohes, or 103 inches — which means a 
diameter of over 34 inches,— the mean annual girth 
inorement having been 219 inohes. It is quite 
evident that special attention should be devoted 
to teak and mahogany, amongst exotio timbers in 
the lowoountry as well as to the Australian eiiea- 
lypti and acacias and to the Himalayan cedars and 
pines, in the higher and wetter regions. There ia 
another valuable timber tree, which baa made 
itself at homo in Ceylon from Colombo up to 
Peradeniya. This is the padouk of Burma and 
the Andamans, which, as a paragraph we recently 
quoted proved, has excited much attention in Britain, 
from the strength and beauty of a spsolmen sent 
from the Andamans. So long ago as 1843, the late 
Mr. William Ferguson attracted attention to the 
magnificent speoiraena of this tree,— botanioally 
Pterocarpus imficiu,— growing near what was then 
the Ceylon Itifles mess.honae, and which ia now 
the property of the Oeylon Commercial Company. 
The handsome umbrageous foliage of this 
tree is oecasionally oontraetad with a wealth of 
golden blossom rich with delioioua perfume. The 
cultivation of this valuable and beantifnl tree 
ongbt certainly to be extended, and sandalwood 
ought to be tried in the Pattalam district and 
other portions ol the island. But why has the 
Forest Department neglected that near relative of 
the mahogany, bat whioh nnlike that tree flonr- 
ishes at 6,000 feet and over, the timber of whioh 
is by many deemed quite eqnal to mahogany,— 
the cedar of Australia, the red toon : Gedrela Toona 
var. eerrata. The grove of these trees near the 
Lake bund at Nuwara Eliya is conolusive as to, 
their Euitability for onltivation at high attitudes 
evon il experience at Darjiling and p^ber Himi* 
