Editors Box. 433 



and in one year I had among other duties the superintendence of stripping 

 upwards of 30,000 larcli trees, which yielded, if I recollect correctly, about 

 227 tons of bark. Having such a large quantity on hand caused some 

 anxiety both to my employer and myself, and we took offers from all the 

 tanners we knew or heard of between Arbroath and Edinburgh, as well 

 as down the Clyde as far as Rothesay. Samples of from 2 cwt. to a ton 

 were asked, and duly sent, for examination and testing. All parties 

 acknowledged it to be good bark, and the highest sum we pocketed for the 

 ton delivered was £1 5s. The trees from which it was stripped were 

 about thirty-five years of age, and in a very healthy condition. I may also 

 state that I offered to let by contract the felling, pruning, peeling, stacking, 

 and thatching, and got an offer for the whole work, at 27s. per ton. I con- 

 sidered this rather too high, and let the felling and pruning only by con- 

 tract for the sum of 6s. 3d. per 100 trees, which was very cheap indeed. 

 I retained the peeling, &c., in my own hands, and employed a large number 

 of women to perform the work, some from the neighbourhood and others 

 from a distance. The highest wages I paid were 10s. per week, and 

 though I cannot now give a definite account of the expense, I am quite 

 sure that every ton of bark cost me for peeling, rancing, stacking, threshing, 

 and bagging somewhere about £l per ton. I had twelve miles of cartage 

 exclusive of railway carriage, and I leave any one to judge for himself 

 if the Rossdhu prices are likely to be realized. A few years ago I sold 

 some excellent larch bark for the sum of £3s. 17s. 6d. delivered, this 

 being the highest of several offers I got for it. 



Those who are ignorant of current prices should be very careful when 

 giving in such returns, so as not to mislead their brethren, and also injure 

 the trade generally. 



Thomas Wilkie, 



Arcllwiglass. Forester. 



A SPANISH CRITIC. 



Sir, — You did me the honour to speak in commendation in the number 

 of the Journal for May of a pamphlet I had issued under the title of " The 

 Schools of Forestry in Europe, a Plea for the Creation of a School of 

 Forestry in connection with the Arboretum in Edinburgh." I fiadit and 

 your review thus noticed in the Revlsta de Monfes, published at the Escurial 

 in Spain : — 



" * The Schools of Forestry in Europe ' is the title of an interesting pamphlet 

 of seventy-two pages published by Dr. Brown, formerly Professor of Botany in 

 the University of Aberdeen, and latterly in the College of Cape Town at the 

 Cape of Good Hope. This work is interesting not only for the information 

 ■which it contains in reference to a great number of schools of forestry in 

 Europe, but also principally because it reveals the spirit which is beginning 

 to be awakened and manifested amongst the men of science in England against 

 the indolence which till lately had existed in that country in regard to 

 forests. Brown, after having travelled through a large part of Europe, visited 

 its forests, and studied almost all the schools of this department, augmented 



