ned,
through a long series of years, a remarkable state of scientific
thoroughness and has greatly increased the annual output of the
forests of that country.

In France, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, Norway, Sweden, Russia
and Denmark, Forestry is also practiced on scientific principles and
the government in each of these countries holds large tracts of
forests in reserve. In British India one finds a highly efficient
Forest Service and in Japan Forestry is receiving considerable
attention.

In the United States, the forest areas are controlled by private
interests, by the Government and by the States. On privately owned
forests, Forestry is practiced only in isolated cases. The States
are taking hold of the problem very actively and in many of them we
now find special Forestry Commissions authorized to care for vast
areas of forest land reserved for State control. These Commissions
employ technically trained foresters who not only protect the State
forests, but also plant new areas, encourage forest planting on
private lands and disseminate forestry information among the
citizens. New York State has such a Commission that cares for more
than a million acres of forest land located in the northern part of
the State. Many other States are equally progressive.

The United States Government is the most active factor in the
preservation of our forests. The Government to-day owns over two
hundred million acres of forest land, set aside as National Forests.
There are one hundred and fifty individual reserves, distributed as
shown in Fig. 137 and cared for by the Forest Service, a bureau in
the Department of Agriculture. Each of the forests is in charge of a
supervisor. He has with him a professional forester and a body of
men who patrol the tract against fire and the illegal cutting of
timber. Some of the men are engaged in planting trees on the open
areas and others in studying the important forest problems of the
region. Fig. 138.

[Illustration: FIG. 137.--Map Showing Our National Forests.]

[Illustration: FIG. 138.--Government Foresters in Missouri Studying the
Growth and Habits of Trees. They are standing in water three feet deep.]

Where cutting is to be done on a National Forest, the conditions are
investigated by a technically trained forester and the cutting is
regulated