192 THE ENGLISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. [Jan. 



herds cropped the seedling trees, so that natural production was 

 arrested and the mature trees in the course of time decayed. The 

 climate became arid ; the watercourses dried np, and the land, ceasmg 

 to bear its fruit in due season, finally became a howling desert. It 

 was his opinion that it was a national duty to provide a supply of 

 timber for the coming generation ; and he hoped it would rest with 

 a Government of England to clothe our mountains with timber, either 

 by the loan of money at a low interest to proprietors, or by taking 

 the matter into their own hands. If our Cumberland fells were 

 clothed with tlie larch and tlie pine tribe, what a mighty change 

 would come over the hills and dales, now left to support a few 

 blackfaced sheep in summer, in respect to the advantages he had 

 referred to, let alone the value of the timber when it arrived at the 

 stage of maturity. M. Boppe, Inspector-General of Forests in France, 

 recently paid a visit to this country to report on the Highland 

 Forests ; and in the course of his report he stated, that if a line were 

 drawn from Greenock to Perth, there would be found north of the 

 boundary no less than five millions of acres, at present regarded as 

 mere waste, which were capable of being converted into valuable 

 timber forests. If that were done, and the forests worked on the 

 German system, they would supply an annual growth of timber fifty 

 or sixty years hence more than double that imported from Eussia, 

 Norway, Sweden, and America. One-half of this area under trees 

 would also be open for grazing purposes, and from the shelter and 

 the superior quality of the grass found in the forests ample food 

 would be afforded to twice as many head of cattle and sheep as the 

 same quantity of moorland or exposed pasture would supply. Still 

 further, the working and management of the forests, and the develop- 

 ment of hundreds of industrial enteriirises connected with them and 

 their products, would afford a steady means of employment and sub- 

 sistence to a large proportion of the inhabitants of the Highlands 

 who at present eked out a precarious living as crofters. We required 

 a trained class of men for our Indian plantations, and if forestry was 

 now fully and intelligently pursued in this country, we could furnish 

 any number of competent men. At the present time our candidates 

 had to go for two or three years to Germany or France where this 

 knowledge is supposed to be much better attained than in England. 

 Hence it became a national question to be able to teach our own 

 candidates. And this could only be done by raising foi-estry to a 

 higher place than it had yet occupied in this country. In conclusion 

 he advised the Society to increase their membership and the interest 

 of landowners and all others connected with land in the subject of 

 forestry, in order that something might be done to promote that 

 progress in the matter which they all desired. 



