118 MANAGEMENT AND SALE OF TIMBER. 



blinding the backs with sawdust. This makes a very good and 

 serviceable road for carting upon, and may be made for £20 to 

 £25 per mile. The writer has made several pieces of this de- 

 scription of road, which answer the end admirably, at the rate of 

 £20 per mile (labour only). In manufacturing wood the writer's 

 experience gives the preference to the portable steam-engine and 

 light portable machinery, which in his estimation possess many 

 advantages over fixed steam saw-mills and water-power. The 

 scope of this paper, however, will not admit of pointing out the 

 relative advantages. 



Plantations are in some cases a very profitable investment, 

 as in others they are the very reverse, either of which results 

 depends almost entirely upon the skill bestowed upon their early 

 culture and planting. Judiciously managed, they are quite as 

 profitable as any other crop the ground produces, while injudi- 

 ciously managed, they become a burden and a loss to the 

 proprietor. In illustration the following instances are offered. 



No. I. is a larch plantation in the county of Sussex grown 

 as a crop of hop-poles, and sold by public auction in the month 

 of November 1855, after having completed its fourteenth growth. 

 The plantation comprised about eleven acres, and was divided into 

 five lots, which were sold at prices varying from £60 to £70 per 

 acre. Allowing £65 as the average price per acre, the following 

 *ire the returns, after cutting and conveying to market when par- 

 tially dried : — 



1400 10-feet length hop-poles, at 20s. per 100, - £14 



1500 12-feet do. do. at 25s. per do., 18 15 



14 



40 



32 



Purchase money per acre, 

 Cutting and clearing the wood, 

 Carriage to market, 

 Wood merchant's profit, 



Against the above there is a sum of £21, 3s. to be charged for 

 planting, keeping down weeds, and interest — thus leaving a clear 

 profit of £43, 17s., which, divided by 14 — the number of years' 

 growth —give? £3, 2s. 7|d. per acre annual returns to the pro- 

 prietor. Similar ground to that occupied by this plantation was 

 rented at 25s. per acre. Balance in favour of planting, £1 17s. 7id. 



One-fourth of the trees either died early, or were too small 

 for hop-poles when the crop was cut, and were converted into 



