86 EDITORIAL NOTES. [Dec. 



And our readers will see that their part in the forthcoming Parlia- 

 mentary campaign is promptly attended to. The thousands of 

 unemployed in our great manufacturing centres, the facts of profitable 

 sjdviculture on barren uplands, to be found farther on in these 

 pages, and the cry of the Skye crofters being greatly one of 

 cold and himger, should induce Parliament to immediate action. 

 Further, the allegations as to the speedy destruction of the timber 

 supplies of our colonies, and the probability of the Britain of the 

 future looking in vain for wood-working material either from within 

 or without, should be thoroughly sifted. Sir John's recent article 

 may reasonably be assumed to be the method of his mode of 

 attacking the problem. Now many of his conclusions rest on M. 

 Boppc's recent report ; and some practical men take exception to 

 solutions of the problem founded on a week's visit by a French 

 professor, who could not then converse in the English tongue. For 

 instance, they say that climatal conditions account for the success 

 of the system of naturally replacing cut-down woods in France, but 

 such conditions are lacking in Scotland. Now, whether this pre- 

 cludes the use of the Continental forestry methods, would best be 

 sifted by a Parliamentary Commission. Then, too, comes the 

 question of forestry education. Sir John himself has courteously 

 enabled us to place his true position in regard to a Scottish Forest 

 School before the public. Two letters on the subject lie before us, 

 the purport of which was read to a committee, and then sent to the 

 newspapers without our permission being asked. If inclined to be 

 captious, we might adduce this in illustration of the general saying, 

 that committees have no conscience. lieferring to a slip of a recent 

 leader in the Courant, Sir John writes : " The writer is entirely in 

 error in supposing that I have any feeling against the establishment 

 of a Forest School in Edinburgh." Again, in another lettei', he 

 writes : " There is, I understand, an idea that my article was intended 

 to discourage the establishment of a Forest School in Edinburgh. 

 If you have an opportunity, I should be glad if you would 

 authoritatively deny this. Such an idea never entered my head, and 

 I only mentioned Cirencester and Downton as being agricultural 

 colleges already in operation." 



I 



The Interxatioxal Fokestky Exhibition Piuze Essays. — The 

 executive have now come to an amicaljle understanding with the 

 competitors. Press exigencies alone necessitate that the list of 

 successful competitors stand over till next month. 



