FORESTS OF FRANCE. 297 
grouped in large masses, in order to discharge to the best ad¬ 
vantage the various functions assigned to them by nature. 
The consumption of wood is rapidly increasing in that empire, 
and a large part of its territory is mountainous, sterile, and 
otherwise such in character or situation that it can be more 
profitably devoted to the growth of wood than to any agricul¬ 
tural use. Hence it is evident that the proportion of forest 
in 1750, taking even Mirabeau’s large estimate, was not very 
much too great for permanent maintenance, though doubtless 
the distribution was so unequal that it would have been sound 
policy to fell the woods and clear land in some provinces, 
while large forests should have been planted in others.* Du- 
policy of felling them, by citing the example of “ divers bishops, cardinals, 
priors, abbots, monkeries, and chapters, which, by cutting their woods, 
have made three profits,” the sale of the timber, the rent of the ground, 
and the “ good portion ” they received of the grain grown by the peasants 
upon it. To this argmnent, Palissy replies : “ I cannot enough detest this 
thing, and I call it not an error, but a curse and a calamity to all France ; 
for when forests shall be cut, all arts shall cease, and they which practise 
them shall be driven out to eat grass with Nebuchadnezzar and the beasts 
of the field. I have divers times thought to set down in writing the arts 
which shall perish when there shall be no more wood; but when I had 
written down a great number, I did perceive that there could be no end 
of my writing, and having diligently considered, I found there was not 
any which could be followed without wood.” * * “And truly I could 
well allege to thee a thousand reasons, but ’tis so cheap a philosophy, that 
the very chamber wenches, if they do but think, may see that without 
wood, it is not possible to exercise any manner of human art or cunning.” 
— CEuvres de Bernard Palissy, p. 89. 
* Since writing the above paragraph, I have found the view I have 
taken of this point confirmed by the careful investigations of Rentzsch, 
who estimates the proper proportion of woodland to entire surface at 
twenty-three per cent, for the interior of Germany, and supposes that near 
the coast, where the air is supplied with humidity by evaporation from 
the sea, it might safely be reduced to twenty per cent. See RentzsclPs 
very valuable prize essay, Dev Wald im EausJialt der JSFatur und der 
VoUcswirthschaft , cap. viii. 
The due proportion in France would considerably exceed that for the 
German States, because France has relatively more surface unfit for any 
growth but that of wood, because the form and geological character of her 
