THE PUHIPUHI KAURI FOREST. 69 
bad finance there would be some set-off from an employment and settlement 
point of view; but here again the balance is all on the side of the 
Kauri—which is perhaps to be expected, since Kauri is here the most 
valuable product of the soil, and it is the soil put to its best use that 
supports most men on the soil. Employment at Waipoua and in culti- 
vated forest generally is discussed at p. 49, ‘‘ Waipoua Kauri Forest,’’ 
and p. 94 here. The following is a sketch of what it would have 
amounted to in a particularly well-stocked forest, such as was Puhi- 
puhi :— 
First Period.—The labour on logging would have been less, but not to 
any great extent; while during: the first stage of forest organization, when 
the virgin forest was being worked and regenerated, there would have 
been the great contrast in employment between a handful of struggling 
pioneer settlers and the extensive Government-paid labour required to 
organize the forest with roads and buildings. The amount of thiy 
organization expenditure would have depended on whether the forest 
was to be worked intensively or extensively. In a Kauri forest it would 
naturally be the former, and in a forest such as was Puhipuhi parti- 
cularly so. During this period, therefore, Puhipuhi would have been 
a busy hive of human industry, and the cost of this would have been 
easily defrayed out of the Kauri saved from the burning and waste. 
This period would have occupied some eight or twelve years or longer, 
depending on the demand for Kauri; and as long as it lasted there 
would be no comparison between forest and grass employment. Perhaps 
the most important point here from a settlement point of view is the 
precious aid in ready cash which would have been afforded to the pioneer 
settler of the neighbourhood, helping him over the difficult early times. 
“It never has been true national economy to leaye the utilization of 
virgin country to solitary settlers, provided with inadequate implements 
and insufficient capital,’’ (Auckland Weekly News, 16th August, 1917.) 
Second or Transition Period.—Here, between the cutting of the virgin 
forest timber and the ripening of the regrowth, is the period of least 
activity and least employment, the “‘ transition period ’’ of the ‘‘ normal 
Kauri forest.’ Taking nearly the figure given at p. 97, average em- 
ployment for the period would have been about one man per 160 acres, 
plus four or five Forest Rangers for the whole forest. This is well in 
excess of dairying employment, even if all the lots had been successfully 
grassed, which is not likely to have been the case on the poor soil at 
Puhipuhi. 
Third or Normal Forest Period.—Here the forest is in a nearly 
normal condition, and employment would have been also nearly normal. 
The process of straightening out the age-classes might have caused some 
temporary irregularity in the employment, but would not have affected 
the average of employment for the period. Taking ordinary European 
rates (see ‘“ Balance Statement,’’ p. 94), employment would have been 
at the rate of one man per 75 acres, or more than double dairy employ- 
ment at its best at Puhipuhi. Thus, compared to dairying (so far as 
the grassing had been successful) cultivated Kauri forest here would have 
given at first much greater employment, then for the transition period of 
about a hundred years a little more employment, and thence onwards 
and always afterwards double or treble the employment on dairying. 
This striking contrast is rendered more startling when one considers 
that it requires a hard-working man to make a precarious living at 
dairying or sheep on this poor soil, The Hon. the Prime Minister is 
