Popular Science Monthly/Volume 19/July 1881/European Schools of Forestry
| EUROPEAN SCHOOLS OF FORESTRY. |
By N. H. EGLESTON.
THE word "forestry" has not yet come into familiar use in this country, and its meaning is understood only by the few; "school of forestry" is still less comprehensible. It is only natural that our people, occupying a region covered to a great extent with a dense and varied growth of trees, in regard to which no apprehension of deficiency has been suggested until within a comparatively short time, should have entertained little thought of the forest as a thing to be specially cared for and cultivated. Much less should it have occurred to them to make its maintenance an object of scientific study, to put the school and the wood, education and trees, into close association, and to think and speak of "schools of forestry."
Both these terms, however, are well understood abroad, and the time has come, in the changed condition of things here, when we should know what they mean, and that practically.
The "school of forestry," or whatever equivalent may be used in different countries, signifies an organization for the purpose of giving instruction in regard to all that pertains to the growth of trees, especially in masses, and their management, including their natural history, their adaptation to the arts, and their influence upon human welfare. It regards the forest in altogether a different light from that in which it is considered with us, or in fact from that in which it has been considered in any country until within a comparatively recent period. Instead of an accidental growth of trees, spared from the general clearing of the ground, which have been suffered to come up in a hap-hazard sort of way, exposed to assault and damage of various kinds, from insects, from browsing cattle allowed to roam freely among them, and from the carelessness, if not the wanton waste, of man, the forest is regarded as a growth carefully provided for, the conditions of its increase are diligently studied beforehand, and all means are used to develop it to the fullest measure of its value according to the purpose for which its cultivation has been undertaken. In short, forestry looks upon the growth of a piece of woods as we look upon the growth of plants in a garden, or a crop in the field of a farmer, as the result both of science and art. Only it is a nobler growth than these, and requires a higher science and nicer art, inasmuch as the trees measure their age by centuries and not by months or seasons, as do the ordinary crops of the garden and the field, and because they have important relations, controlling relations even to agriculture itself, to climate, to commerce, and the industrial arts, and so to the highest interests of national life.
The work of forestry, as understood in Europe, contemplates not only the proper care of existing woodlands, but the replanting of districts which have been stripped of their forests, and also the planting of forests in new places, where such planting may be advantageously done. Schools of forestry have their origin in the desire to accomplish this most successfully. The growth of a forest is the work of a century, and even more. It is not properly to be undertaken with only the limited intelligence or care with which we cultivate the annual crops of our fields. If the work is begun without adequate preparation, or is conducted in a faulty manner, the mistake can not be remedied soon, if at all. If one makes a mistake in the culture of ordinary crops, he can correct it the next year; but, if he plants a forest on an erroneous plan, the mistake is not one of a year, but of a hundred, or even two hundred years. Not only is it necessary that the botany of the trees should be understood, the nature and habits of the various species be studied, and their adaptations to different soils and situations, as well as to different practical uses when grown, be regarded, but the laws of meteorology are to be considered and conformed to. The knowledge of geology and mineralogy is also involved, as well as the laws of mechanics. Indeed, no sooner is the subject taken into consideration in its true character, than it is seen to be interwoven with a very large range of studies, so that something like schools of forestry seem almost at once desirable, if not indispensable.
The beginning of forest schools may be dated from 1770, when Frederick the Great established a course of theoretical instruction in forestry at Berlin. This, however, was irregular, dependent upon the competency of the professors at the university, for the time being, to give instruction upon the subject. The course was greatly deficient, at the best, on account of its entire lack of technical teaching. This defect, felt more and more, finally led to the establishment of an academy for forest instruction at Berlin in 1821, under the general superintendence of Pfeil, then Oberforstrath. The academy was not organically connected with the university, but was brought into such an association with it that the professors and apparatus of instruction belonging to the university could be used for teaching the fundamental and accessory sciences, while technical forestry was taught by professors in the academy specially qualified for the work. This arrangement, however, did not prove satisfactory. Too much prominence was given to the accessory sciences, and too little to forestry proper. Especially was the lack of sufficient instruction in practical forestry felt, there being no suitable woodland in the neighborhood of Berlin in which the theoretical instruction could be practically illustrated and applied. Excursions to distant forests, which could be made only infrequently, did not meet the want. On the advice of the superintendent, seconded by the energetic support of the two Humboldts, the academy was removed in 1830 to Neustadt-Eberswalde, about twenty-four miles northeast of Berlin, under the name of the High Institution for Forest Science. The school was now in the immediate vicinity of two large forest districts, affording every facility for instruction in practical forestry. The superintendent of the academy was made also administrator of the forest districts. Associated with him, as instructor in forestry proper, were two others as teachers of the natural sciences and of mathematics and geodesy. At the same time a teacher of Prussian jurisprudence, with particular reference to forest matters, was added, and, after an interval of twenty years, a second teacher of forest science was appointed. Since 1866 important changes have been made in the organization of the academy, and the number of instructors has been largely increased. There are now three teachers of forest science, a teacher of mathematics, physics, mechanics, and meteorology; one of chemistry, mineralogy, and geognosy; one of botany, one of zoölogy, and one of jurisprudence. In addition, there are a royal chief forest officer, as assistant teacher of road-construction, geodesy, and plan-drawing, and also a chemist as assistant teacher of geology. The principal forest meteorological station of Germany is also in connection with this school.
The course of instruction in the schools of forestry extends from two years to two and a half, or five semesters, the tendency having been constantly to protract the time. The course at Neustadt-Eberswalde embraces five semesters. The branches taught are arranged in three groups, viz., "Fundamental Sciences," "Principal Sciences," and "Secondary Sciences." Under the heading of "Fundamental Sciences" are included: 1. Natural Sciences.—Chemistry, theoretic and applied; physics and meteorology; mineralogy and geognosy; botany, and forest botany in particular, with anatomy of plants, vegetable physiology and pathology, and botanical excursions; microscopy; zoölogy, with especial study of forest insects, preparations, and excursions: to all of which 840 hours are allotted. 2. Mathematics.—Geodesy; interest and rent account; wood-measuring; surveying and leveling exercises; plan-drawing exercises: 440 hours. 3. Economical Sciences.—Public economy and finances: 48 hours. Whole time allotted to "Fundamental Sciences," 1,328 hours. In the "Principal Sciences" are included what relate especially to forests, their cultivation, protection, technics in various branches, legal and customary usages, etc., with forest excursions: to all of which 980 hours are allotted. In the "Secondary Sciences" are jurisprudence (civil and criminal law, constitutional rights, etc.), construction of roads, and shooting exercises: to which 340 hours are given. Of the total, 2,648 hours of instruction, 50 per cent, are given to the "fundamental," 37 per cent, to the "principal," and 13 per cent, to the "secondary" sciences. The average time of lessons, counting the five semesters as including ninety-three weeks, is 28·5 hours per week, or 4·9 hours per day. From this it will be seen that nearly five hours are given to lectures each day. Nearly as much more time is expected to be given to study, making almost ten hours of daily work for the students. If we compare this with the average time during which the students in our colleges are employed, it will be seen that a course of instruction at one of these forest academies is more than equivalent, in the amount of work done, to an ordinary college course.
The forest schools, as at present existing, may be divided into three classes, according as they are forest schools strictly and independently—that is, schools situated in the forest as well as teaching the art of forest management or as they form only a part of the general course of instruction at the university or polytechnic school; or as, again, they are united with agricultural schools, and the attempt is made to teach forestry and agriculture together. There has been of late years a good deal of discussion, in Germany especially, as to which of these arrangements is to be preferred. The academies at Neustadt-Eberswalde, Münden, Eisenach, and at Nancy, in France, are examples of the first class. Those at Giessen, at the Polytechnic School at Zürich and the projected arrangement at the university of Munich, are examples of the second class; while the establishments at Hohenheim, Vienna, St. Petersburg, and Stockholm, are examples of the third class.
On behalf of the first class it is urged that when the academy is located in the forest there will be greater facilities for the practical study of all that relates to the growth of trees, their influence upon climate, and the like. On behalf of a connection of the forest academies with the universities and polytechnic schools or with schools of agriculture, it is urged that this would be an economical arrangement because only the technical teaching of forestry would have to be provided for, instruction in the fundamental and allied sciences being already abundantly secured in the necessary endowment of the ordinary educational establishments. The argument for the union of the separate forest schools with the universities, as put by Dr. Richard Hess, formerly Professor of Forestry and now director of the Forestry Department of the University of Giessen, in a recent work of his, may be taken as a fair exhibition of the reasoning of those who favor the union of the forest schools with the universities. He claims that the universities can always command for their various chairs men of the highest ability, and this, in the first place, because the position of such a professor is the most independent one, the instructors in the forest schools being dependent upon the director; secondly, because the universities have better libraries and apparatus than the forest schools can have by themselves; thirdly, the natural stimulation of colleagues in allied chairs is a powerful motive to excellence; fourthly, the latest developments of science in the related departments of instruction will be found in the universities; fifthly, the professors in connection with the universities receive a better income than those in the isolated forest schools; and, finally, the academic atmosphere of the great university is of value, and helpful to professors and students alike. These reasons are forcibly urged in addition to those economical considerations which we have already mentioned. Professor Hess also adduces the practical fact that the forests of Hesse show the very best management, and are visited by foresters from abroad on this account, and that the forest management of Hesse took a high position at the Congress of Foresters held in connection with the Vienna Exposition in 1873.
The tendency of opinion, especially in the central and southern portions of Germany, seems to be in favor of attaching the forest academies to the universities. More and more there is demanded, in those who are called to important positions in the forestry service, the most thorough academical education, and one now has very little chance of gaining a high position in the management of the government forests who has not had a complete university education. Without this he can hope to occupy only a subordinate place. The tendency of the opinion of those most competent to judge in the case is shown also by the fact that at a convention of foresters held at Freyburg in 1874, and numbering three hundred and sixty-nine members, it was declared unanimously that the isolated system of forest instruction will no longer suffice, and the study of forestry in connection with the universities was favored.
One of the most recently established schools is that at Münden under the directorship of Dr. Gustav Heyer. Its management is like that at Neustadt-Eberswalde, and the average number of students has been about seventy-five. The Central Forest Institute at Aschaffenburg, Bavaria, one of the most distinguished schools, has grown out of a forest institute established originally in 1807, which by a decree of the Government in 1874 was united with the University of Munich. It is under the direction of Stumpf, who is assisted by five professors. This school has had the benefit and honor of the labors of Dr. Ernst Ebermayer, whose work on the "Physical Influences of Forests on the Earth and Air," published in 1873, in two volumes octavo, ranks as one of the most important treatises upon this subject.
The Royal Saxon Forest Academy at Tharandt is justly distinguished. It is now under the care of Dr. J. F. Judeich, who was president of the jury of award on exhibitions of forestry at Vienna in 1873. The course of instruction occupies two years and a half, under a director aided by four professors and two assistants. The average attendance of students is about fifty, more than half of whom are foreigners. The number in attendance has lately been much increased, and several Americans are reported among them.
In Würtemberg is the agricultural and forestral academy at Hohenheim, which has grown out of two separate institutions founded in 1818, and united two years afterward. It was reorganized in 1865, and is now one of the most important of the German schools, its course of instruction both in agriculture and forestry being very full. It is located on a princely estate near Stuttgart. It has a noble park of twenty acres, and extensive plantations or nurseries of trees and plants both native and foreign. Between seven and eight hundred acres of land are devoted to the purposes of agriculture, and between five and six thousand acres are devoted to the study and uses of forestry. This academy is probably the best specimen which Germany affords of the combined agricultural and forestral school. It has extensive and valuable collections. Its course of instruction extends to two and a half years. Its faculty consists of a director, nine professors and seven adjunct professors, two reviewers, and one assistant.
Professor Mathieu, of Nancy, describing this institution in the "Review of Woods and Forests," says: "The little kingdom of Würtemberg, with scarcely two million of inhabitants, has spared nothing in providing itself with whatever could contribute to the success of instruction or to the progress of science. This truly liberal spirit has led to the establishment of magnificent agricultural galleries, where we find collected, to the number of sixteen hundred, the various tools and machines employed in labors of the field; elegant rooms filled with forestral collections, implements, woods, and various products; cabinets in botany, zoölogy, mineralogy, and geology; instruments for use in studies of physics and geodesy; a station for experiments concerning woods, and another for meteorology. Its library numbers five thousand five hundred volumes, and its reading-room contains numerous periodicals in all languages, of which forty-nine are scientific, agricultural, or forestral journals, and thirty-five are of the political, literary, or illustrated class."
The design of this academy is, in the words of another, "to impart a thorough, practical, and professional education to those who are to become the owners or managers of estates, and to farmers and foresters in public or private service, and to enable them to become champions of progress among their colleagues in business."
At the University of Tübingen, a chair of Agriculture and Forestry has existed since 1817.
The Polytechnic School at Carlsruhe, in Baden, has a department of forestry, with two professors. From thirty-five to forty students attend, of whom about one fifth are foreigners. The requirements for admission are as follows: Citizens of the state, who wish to enter the state forestry service, after attending a full course at the gymnasium, are admitted, and must pass through a course of four years, of which the first two are devoted to those fundamental and auxiliary studies which do not relate directly to forest-science, but which serve as a preparation for the remaining two years' studies, or the forest-course proper. Foreigners may attend the first two years or not, as they prefer. An age of seventeen years is required for admission. At the close of the second year the state students must pass an examination in natural philosophy and mathematics; but if they fail they are allowed one more trial. This examination entitles them to enter upon the last two years of special forest studies, in which they are taught agriculture, forest jurisprudence, and the higher mathematics, when they are again examined, and, if passed, are qualified for a place in the state service. The examination at the end of the first two years is by the professors of the polytechnic school, and the final examination by the forest directors, a person skilled in law, a professor of agriculture, a professor of forest management, and two professors of mathematics.
After passing all examinations, the candidate is assigned to the general district foresters as an assistant, to enable him to become practically acquainted with his duties, and he receives a tract of forest to manage. After six to ten years, according to the number waiting, he gets a position as general district forester. The number of forest districts in Baden at present is one hundred and ten, to about four of which appointments are made annually. The Forest Direction has its seat in Carlsruhe, and is composed of six members, who are inspectors.
The aids to instruction at this forest school are a valuable collection of objects pertaining to the subject, a chemical and physiological laboratory, to which a greenhouse is annexed, and a forest garden. The area of forests in Baden is 1,262,493 acres.
A school of forestry was established in connection with the University of Giessen, in Hesse-Darmstadt, in 1825, with two chairs of forestry and a course of three years. In 1831 this school was united with the university, of which it now forms a department. The fundamental and auxiliary sciences, mathematics, natural sciences, chemistry, agriculture, law, etc., are taught by the professors of the university, while those studies that immediately relate to forestry come within the care of this special department.
The academic forest garden occupies six hectares, and Giessen and Schiffenberg forest-reviers in the neighborhood afford opportunities for practical study. The course of instruction extends through two years. Two excursions are made weekly, at which the subject of the lectures is practically illustrated, and the various operations of sylviculture are shown. Besides these, journeys of one or two weeks at a time are taken in summer, under the guidance of one of the teachers. The students of the forest institute enjoy the same rights as those of the university. The average attendance in the forestry department for several years past has been only about fifteen.
In the Grand-duchy of Saxe-Weimar is a forest institute, at Eisenach, with three professors and a course of instruction extending through three semesters. This institute was founded as a private school in 1808 by Oberforstrath König, at Rhula, but was made a state institution in 1830.
The Ducal Polytechnic School of Brunswick, founded in 1745 by Duke Charles I, and the first polytechnic school ever established, has a department of forestry.
In addition to these forest schools of the first order, as they may be termed, are subordinate schools at Weihmstephan and at Lichtenhof, near Nuremberg, besides numerous academies and private schools in which the principles of forestry are taught. Many forestry associations also, in one way or another, encourage the study of this science.
When we consider the limited territory of Germany, as compared with our own country, one can not take even this cursory observation of its forest schools without having the conviction impressed upon him that forestry is there regarded as a subject of the first importance, and that it has interests and relations which are very much if not altogether overlooked by us.
France has an eminent forest school at Nancy, which was established more than fifty years ago, and has a director and ten professors. It is designed to prepare agents for the state forest service, and foresters for the management of forests belonging to communes and public establishments. The number of pupils admitted is regulated by the wants of the administration from time to time. During the last fifty years, the school has graduated about a thousand men. In addition to those admitted to be trained for the public service, a certain number are admitted who are called externes. Great Britain, which has no school of forestry of her own, sends annually to Nancy from five to ten pupils to be trained for the management of her forests in India, and in the South African and other colonies.
The course of instruction at Nancy covers two years, and is very much like that at the German schools.
Another school, called the school of Forest Guards, at Barres, was established in 1865, by the Director-General of Forests, on what had been the estate of an eminent arboriculturist, M. Vilmorin. It has been reorganized recently and its plan has been extended.
An Agronomic Institute has been established lately at the Conservatory of Arts and Trades at Paris, having for its object the advancement of agriculture. It has fifteen professors, several of whom will be instructors of forestry in some of its branches. In addition to the instruction in forestry thus given, the French forestry administration is accustomed to send out agents to instruct classes in forestry at several of the agricultural schools. There are also inferior forest schools for the education of subaltern foresters at Grenoble and Villers-Cotterets.
The Austrian Empire is second only to Germany in the abundance and character of its forest schools and in the general interest taken in the subject of forestry. At the head of the Austrian schools stands the Imperial High School of Agriculture and Forestry at Vienna. This was founded by a royal decree of 1872, upon the basis of a reorganized forest school originally established at Mariabrunn, near Vienna, at the entrance of the beautiful Wienerwald. The school occupied an old monastery, and in it were gathered the amplest apparatus for study, including very fine museums and collections. By the decree of 1872 this school was united with the Agricultural College of Vienna, and the two now constitute one school in two sections. The agricultural section was opened in 1872, the forest section in 1875. The consolidated institution is designed to give the best instruction both in agriculture and forestry. The course of instruction extends over three years. Two classes of students are admitted: the ordinary, who must bring a certificate that they have completed a course at a gymnasium or upper real-school, or a department school of equal rank; and the extraordinary, who must have sufficient preparatory training at least to enable them to understand the lectures, and who must have reached the age of seventeen years. The latter class are also obliged to pay tuition fees and can not receive the state stipends of which the ordinary pupils may avail themselves.
What are called secondary schools of forestry are established at Weisswasser in Bohemia, Eulenberg in Moravia, and at Lemberg in Galicia. These schools are formed on the German model. The course of instruction embraces two years. The requirements for admission are attendance for one year at a lower real-school or gymnasium, and in some cases a year's forest practice besides. Tuition is practically free.
There are also schools of forestry in Hungary. One is the Royal Hungarian Mining and Forest Academy at Schemnitz, which has been developed from a School of Mines established as long ago as 1765. A forest institute was begun in 1807. Reorganizations have frequently taken place, until now the course of instruction is divided into six classes, two of which relate to forestry and forest engineering. The whole course is arranged for four years. From a memorial volume published recently, and soon after the celebration of the first centennial of the academy, it appears that it has graduated 5,373 pupils. The average annual attendance in recent years has been about 150.
Other schools of a lower grade, having a course of instruction of only one year in extent, are established at Aggsbach, in Lower Austria, and at Wildalpen, in Styria.
The Austro-Hungarian Empire has also many societies, which, though not schools of forestry, have a more or less direct relation to that subject and do much to promote it. Such are the Forest Society of the Tyrol, the Forestry Association of Manhartsburg, in Lower Austria, the Vienna Joint Stock Company for Forestry, the Forestry Company of Styria and Carinthia, the Association of Moravia and Bohemia, the Society of Western Galicia, and several others. In Croatia is a School of Agriculture and Forestry, with five professors, and a course of study of three years.
The Federal Union of the Swiss Cantons established a Polytechnic School at Zürich in 1855, in which a school of forestry forms the fifth division of instruction. The course of teaching extends to two years and a half. The separate cantons also make provision for elementary instruction in the science and art of forestry; and still further provision is made for the teaching of the subject. As different states or kingdoms have a common interest in the navigation of a river which flows through their territories, and will rightly insist upon its being unimpeded, so it has been found by the cantons that they often have a common interest in the preservation of forests which may be situated in separate cantons, because their effects reach far beyond their particular locality. One canton might be more harmed by the destruction of a forest belonging to another canton than that canton itself. Accordingly, through the influence of the Swiss Forestry Association and the help of others acting with them, the Federal Constitution was amended in 1873, by the adoption of an article declaring that "the Federal Union has the right of supervising structures for the protection of watercourses and of the forest police in the mountain-regions." In the exercise of this right, the Union in 1876 enacted a comprehensive law, embodied in thirty-one distinct articles, relating to the high surveillance of the Confederation over the police of forests in the elevated regions.
For the more effectual carrying out of this law, provision was made in the same year for holding what may be called forest institutes, in the several cantons, during two months every year. At these institutes practical instruction is given in forestry, little if any attention being bestowed on theories. The course of instruction embraces the following subjects, and we give the schedule, as suggesting what perhaps may be profitably done in this country at present, and while waiting for the establishment of fully endowed forest schools.
1. Forest surveys; the marking out of woodlands; measurement and calculation of small areas, as also of the trunks of trees, linear distances, etc.; estimation of single trees and parcels of forest, as to quantity and value; making of forest roads; means of shielding forests against avalanches and small slides.
2. Study of the kinds of wood and of injurious herbs that should be known by sub-foresters.
3. Elementary study of the soil, and of the relations between different kinds of soils, and of the nature of different tracts of land.
4. Indispensable ideas of climatology and meteorology.
5. Cultivation and management of forests.
6. The information most important to sub-foresters concerning the working of forests, forest police and protection, and bookkeeping.
7. The number of pupils shall not exceed thirty.
The applicants must be at least eighteen years of age, and must pass an examination in the primary studies as taught at the best schools; and, if, at the end of the course of instruction, they are approved, they receive a certificate which puts them in the way of an appointment to the care of the high forests of which the Confederation has assumed the control, or of the forests still managed by the cantons separately, or by other corporations.
The teachers of these institutes are appointed by the cantons, subject to the approval of the Federal authority, but they are paid from the general treasury.
Italy, which has suffered greatly from the removal of her forests, and has taken action similar to that of the Swiss Confederation for their control, has an Institute of Forestry in the vale of Vallombrosa. It is situated in a noble wood of firs, high upon the slope of the Apennines, near the source of the Arno, where it puts to good use an old convent. In its plan of instruction the institute at Vallombrosa is much like that at Nancy.
Distinguished as Sweden is for her interest in education, statistics showing that at the present time only three per cent. of her criminals even are without school-training, we should expect that she would not be behind other countries in the matter of forestral instruction; nor is she. A competent observer tells us that of late years "strenuous and successful endeavors have been made to introduce into the management of the forests the latest improvements adopted in Germany and France, and to regulate the national forest economy in accordance with the most advanced forest science of the day." The system of instruction established embraces a Forest Institute at Stockholm, which, in the language of the royal ordinance for its management, "has for its end to educate able forest managers by free instruction"; subordinate to this, a system of district forest schools, of which the same ordinance says, "The aim of these forest schools is, through gratis instruction, to form good foresters"; and, finally, the common schools, together with private elementary schools of forestry, aided to some extent by the Government.
The Forest Institute at Stockholm ranks with the best forest schools of Europe. Its course of instruction and its management are so nearly like those in use at Nancy, at Neustadt-Eberswalde, and elsewhere, that we need not speak of them in detail.
The district forest schools are established at suitable points in the public forests. They are under the oversight of the Forest Bureau, and each under the visitation of the forest inspector in whose district of service the school is situated. Each forest school is presided over by a president, who is at the same time the teacher of the school, with a forest overseer as his assistant. The course of instruction embraces one full year, at the end of which the pupils have a public examination. In 1874 there were seven schools of this kind. There were alse thirteen private elementary schools of forestry, supported in part by government aid. It is also a noticeable feature of the system of education in Sweden that horticulture and tree-planting are taught in the Falk schools, or common schools. From the report of 1873 we find that in that year 59,860 pupils received such instruction. The same ratio would give 600,000 pupils for the United States.
Spain and Portugal, ranking lowest almost of all European countries in the proportion of their forest area to their total surface, the one having, on the authority of Reutzsch, 5·52, and the other 4·40 per cent., are yet not without their forest schools. A School of Forest Engineers was established in 1846, at Villaviciosa, not far from Madrid. In 1869 it was transferred to San Lorenzo del Escurial. It is under the direction of the Minister of Agriculture. Is has a director, nine professors, and two assistants. The course of instruction extends to three years.
An Agricultural Institute was founded at Lisbon in 1852. It was reorganized in 1865 as the General Institute of Agriculture. The course of instruction embraces rural engineering, sylviculture, agronomy, forest engineering, and veterinary medicine. The corps of instruction consists of ten professors and five substitutes, as they are called. The institute is well furnished with grounds, cabinets, and collections adapted to give practical instruction in the studies taught.
Denmark and Finland also have their schools of forestry, the one at Copenhagen, under the title of the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural High School, and the other at Evois.
Russia has several schools scattered throughout her vast territory. For although her forests, particularly in the northern portion, seem inexhaustible, yet even among these the waste by accidental and designed burnings has at length shown the necessity of care and economy in forestry management. The forests of Russia have been swept off year by year by fires until portions of the country are suffering in a change of climate and in other respects as the consequence. The Volga is diminished in volume; navigation is becoming more difficult; fuel is getting scarce; and the services of those trained in forest schools are needed in Russia almost as much as they are in Italy or Spain.
The Agronomic Institute at St. Petersburg is designed to give the best education in both agriculture and sylviculture, and is organized for this purpose in two sections. Those admitted to it must have finished a course of instruction at some gymnasium. It has one hundred and fifty students in the forestry section, a three years' course of study, and graduates annually about forty pupils.
The Agricultural and Forestral Academy at Petrovsk, near Moscow, founded in 1865, is similar in character and course of instruction to the institute at St. Petersburg. In 1872 it had three hundred and thirty-three pupils in attendance.
About fifty miles from St. Petersburg is the forest school of Lissino, a school of the second class, whose graduates receive the rank of forest conductors. The course of studies is of a practical character, and is of three years in extent.[1]
- ↑ This sketch gives a partial idea of the importance that is attached to forestry in countries whose age and experience have carried them beyond the stage of wasteful expenditure of resources in wood through which we are passing, to the point where necessity compels them to do all that is possible to make amends for their former recklessness, and to endeavor by every means to restore what they have lost. The trees are recognized as one of man's most valuable inheritances—with which his fortunes, public and private, are intimately associated; and no interest in state or nation is paramount to that of having them preserved and properly cared for. The sources of information in regard to forestry and forest schools are of course as yet chiefly foreign. J. Croumbie Brown, of Haddington, England, for some time Government botanist at the Cape of Good Hope, has published several volumes bearing more or less directly on the subject. Hon. C. C. Andrews, late Minister to Sweden and Norway, has made a valuable report to the Department of State on the forests and forest-culture of Sweden. A report on forests and forestry, in connection with the International Exhibition at Vienna, in 1873, has also been made by John A. Warder, one of our commissioners. A voluminous report upon forestry has also been made, under the direction of the Commissioner of Agriculture, in pursuance of an act of Congress of 1876, by Franklin B. Hough, which contains a large amount of valuable information. We have drawn from these, in addition to the numerous French and German publications on forestry, for the facts here given in regard to forest schools.