" In this spirit he helps himself to the fruit in
his neighbour's garden when too lazy to cultivate the ground for
himself.
This child of nature is by instinct a nomadic shepherd and herdsman; he
hates forests, and will ruthlessly burn down the finest trees to make a
clearing for sheep-pastures. It is impossible to travel twenty miles in
the Southern Carpathians without encountering the terrible ravages
committed by these people in the beautiful woods that adorn the sides of
the mountains.
"The Wallacks find it too much trouble to fell the trees," says Mr
Boner. "They destroy systematically: one year the bark is stripped off,
the wood dries, and the year after it is fired.... In 1862, near
Toplitza, 23,000 _joch_ of forest were burned by the peasantry."
Judging from what I saw during my travels in Hungary in 1875-76, I
should say the evil described by Mr Boner ten years before has in no way
abated. The Wallacks pursue their ruthless destruction of the forests,
and the law seems powerless to arrest the mischief. At present there is
wood and enough, but the time will come when the country at large must
suffer from this reckless waste. There are about twenty-three million
acres of forest in Hungary, including almost the only oak-woods left in
Europe. The great proportion of the forest-land belongs to the State,
hence the supervision is less keen, and the depredations more readily
winked at.
Pages:
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62