the so-called “loose-wood” from the parish forests, and such acts, lie the historic foundation of an almost communist tradition.  Where else has anything of the kind been perpetuated except in the case of the forest?  The latter is the root of truly German social conditions.  In very truth the forest, with us, has not yet been completely portioned off; therefore every political agitator who wishes to pay out in advance to the people a little bit of “prosperity” as earnest-money of the promised universal prosperity, immediately lays hands upon the forest.  By means of the forest, and by no other, you can substantially preach communism to the German peasant.  It is well known that the idea of the forest as private property was introduced at a late date and gained ground gradually among the German people.

Forest, pasturage, water, are, in accordance with a primitive German principle of jurisprudence, intended for the common use of all inhabitants of the same district.  The old alliteration “wood, wold and water,” has not yet been entirely forgotten by the people.  Thus a dim and feeble memory, a well-nigh forgotten legend, looking upon the common claim to general use of the forest as a natural right which had been in force since the beginning of time, confirms the conclusions of the historian, according to whom community of possession of the forest was a true old Germanic idea.  Such a line of argument, however, could also bring us to the further conclusion that this community of possession has only once been fully realized—­namely, by and in the primeval forest.

In times of excitement men have worked out on paper wonderful arithmetical problems concerning the partition of the soil of the forest into small plots of ground for the poor.  Paper is very forbearing, and it looks very idyllic and comfortable to see, carefully calculated before our eyes, how many hundreds of dear little estates could be made out of the meagre soil of the forest, on which the proletarian could settle down to the contented patriarchal existence of a farmer.  Practical attempts along this line have not been wanting, but, instead of diminishing the proletariat, such an increase of small farms only served to augment it all the more; practice is ahead of theory.  The people should have thanked God that the forest, almost alone, had not been parceled out; yet, instead, they were ready even to destroy the forest in order to assist the small farmer!  In many parts of Germany the poor farmer would starve if the traditional free use of the forest did not form a steady annuity for him.  The forest helps in a hundred ways to place the petty farms on a solid foundation; if, therefore, men destroy the forests in order to increase the number of petty farms, they are undermining firmly rooted existences in order, in their place, to plant new ones upon the sand.