There has been an increase in cutting during the period that has followed 1912, just as there was in the period of like duration that immediately preceded that year. Some have attributed this to the advance in valuations. One investigator thinks the abruptness of the increase was the cause. It is doubtless true that a man in his rage will sometimes sacrifice his property. A taxpayer of Laconia announced that if his timber lot was "put up" he would sell and the city would not get another tax. He was as good as his word. The next year the sawed lumber lay upon the sticks. The assessors measured it and taxed it to another man. Then the chairman, who knew the terms of the sale, said to the seller, "John, I don't want you to get mad about it, but you got for your lumber just about one half of what it was worth." The other half, to say nothing of the natural increment, would manifestly have paid the additional taxes for many years to come. But despite a few extreme cases, the fact remains that neither the increase in valuations nor the manner in which it was made has forced any considerable quantity of growth into the . market. It is now seen how empty were the fears, threats and predictions of speedy and complete denudation in case the law was enforced.

Forest property can afford to pay the taxes that are now imposed. They are assessed at the same rate as upon other property in the same taxing district. It is the distinction of our system or its disgrace, according to the point of view, that as to all property it has but one rule for valuation and but one for rate.

If we take a tract of land that has been cut over and cut hard, as the lumbermen say, we find it has very little value. It is therefore lightly appraised and lightly taxed. For a long time its appreciation is almost imperceptible. During the first ten or fifteen years the annual tax assessed upon it is not likely to be more than a few cents an acre,

growth develops, and especially as it nears maturity, the value of the property increases, and if the selectmen are faithful, the valuation keeps pace with it. At all times the test is what was the property worth on taxing day?

This question many selectmen are competent to answer for themselves. For the rest there is a guide in the market for forest land. This market is state wide, and though not so formal or active as that for securities on the stock exchange or at the broker's board, it is more accurate and reliable than they because there is no short selling or other form of speculation. The buyers and sellers are hardheaded men—men of observation and experience, farmers, lumbermen and traders.

This real estate market, like the stock market, discounts the future. It estimates with reasonable precision the worth of the next yield and also the cost of carrying the property together with a reasonable profit. The difference is the net. When this is not available for years to come, the present worth is taken, and that is the price. It will not be believed that the considerations fixed by these buyers and sellers after examination, discussion and negotiation are as a rule otherwise than fair and just to both parties. As such they indicate substantial value in even deforested land. Selectmen without personal knowledge of woodcraft are justified in accepting them as bases of appraisals.

Not only is it the judgment of investors backed by their money and confirmed by their experience that even cut over lands have attractive values to purchase and to hold until the next growth matures, but this position can be supported mathematically.

The financial maturity of pine is now understood to be reached in about forty years. The corresponding age in spruce is sixty years. For present purposes a mean of fifty years may be taken, but sixty, seventy, or even eighty

acre of pine stumpage at present prices is not less than $300 and of spruce one half as much. For the sake of good measure, the land itself may be thrown in.

Now let the amount invested and two per cent for taxes and one half of one per cent for fire protection, if any, bear interest at five per cent, compounded annually. On this basis the present worth of $300 accruing.fifty years hence is above $8. More than this sum can safely be paid for an acre of pine or two acres of spruce for reasons that follow.

Forest lands do not feel the pressure of taxes until the growth approaches maturity, whereas compound interest proceeds in a constant ratio.

The great lumber companies in normal times are able to hire money for long terms at less than five per cent, while under the operation of our exemption law five per cent money is available to individuals upon satisfactory real estate security.

Taxes are not likely to reach an average of two per cent, especially if the unincorporated places are included, as they must be. Increasing values with corresponding valuations should prevent if otherwise there would be danger.

Nothing need be charged for care, which is usually slight. It is many times compensated for in the lower two thirds of the state by pasturage and by growth removed for fuel, fence posts, rails and other rough agricultural and domestic uses, which removal positively benefits the lots. In the upper third, which includes the unincorporated places, it is more than covered by the margin in the two per cent allowed for taxes.

Fire losses, under our excellent system of protection, are less than one fourth of one per cent. Indeed, in 1911, a dry year with excessive damage, the loss computed on the basis of $100,000,000 of forest property was not over 15/100 of one per cent. The next year it was about 4/100

they are usually profitable. In the country at large through a series of years the fire loss on 30,000,000 acres of forest property assumed to be mostly without protection has been less than one half of one per cent.

Wind is not often destructive, except when an opening is made for it in lumbering operations.

Insects and disease will come and go, as they always have, causing great alarm but taking relatively slight toll of the trees. Attention may be called to the tent caterpillar, the canker worm, the elm leaf and maple leaf beetles, the pine rust of a few years ago, the brown-tail and the gypsy moths. They are gone or rapidly going, but the woods remain. The damage done by these pests as well as fire and wind is by natural process liquidated out of the growth affected as it occurs. It therefore no longer exists to be made a charge, like interest and taxes, against the same property or the portion thereof that remains.

It is not claimed that the general property tax is correct in theory or just in practice. It may sometime pass away and there may be few mourners at its bier. But upon the foregoing facts it is fair to argue that it does not impose an undue burden upon forests and has had little to do with their felling.

There is no mystery about the increasingly rapid removal of growth in recent years. The real cause, seldom mentioned by the advocates of classification, is the demand of the pulp mills and the saw mills, which have labored unceasingly to meet the requirements of innumerable uses and have failed.

In the period covered by the twelfth census, 1890 to 1900, the production of wood pulp and paper in New Hampshire was so stimulated that the value of the product increased from $1,282,022 to $7,245,733. In the next decade it reached the enormous total of $13,994,272. In the first ten years it increased 465 per cent, and in the

It cannot be doubted that there was a similar increase in the production of pine products.

Fifteen years ago the price of pine and spruce stumpage each averaged about $4 a thousand feet. Today it is easily $10. How insignificant in comparison is, the recent advance in forest taxes or even those taxes themselves as affected by the advance!

The present generation of investors has had the advantage of a rising market-a market with few and unimportant recessions and the end is not yet. The federal government is bidding unthought of prices for many varieties of lumber, but especially for pine and spruce. The war is known to be depleting the forests of Germany. It is threatening the very existence of those of Great Britain and France, now none too numerous or extensive. It is a source of regret as well as pride that our own state forester, our own lumber jacks and our own portable mills are leading in the work of destruction. After the war Europe will need to be reconstructed. The demands of the building arts in this country will be greatly augmented, and prices will continue to soar. Under these circumstances to reduce the taxes on forests would simply add to the already ample profits of the lumber operators and of the larger owners.

The farmer would not be benefited by classification. He has never yet received the return to which he was entitled for his lumber. "The farmer is usually the sufferer," said a recent forestry report, "who, as a rule, poor, will 'skin' his land and ship the wood to a pulp mill for any reasonable price." Of course pine is sacrificed as well as

spruce.

There is another consideration. Farmers, speaking by and large, all have wood lots. The classification of these would not affect the appropriations or the amount of the tax levy one particle. Consequently, if taxes were made to rest more lightly on the wood lot they would necessarily