1022 JOURNAL OF FORI'STKV 



to heavier fellings, which are making serious inroads into the available 

 forest capital of the home forests. The book includes an introduction 

 and four parts. The former takes Evelyn's Sylva as a text and brings 

 it down to present times. The Sylva appeared in 1664 and immediate 

 and speedy planting was the chief note that it carried to the British 

 nation. If Evelyn's warning of two and a half centuries ago and that 

 of British foresters of the past two centuries had been better heeded 

 during the past century, the closing paragraph in the introduction to 

 Stebbing's book would be vastly different. This paragraph reads as 

 follows : 



"This planting question should no longer be delayed. Our waste 

 lands should no longer be left unproductive. Is the nation going to see 

 to it that this work is carried out ? And may the nation hope that that 

 Great Britain Society which soon after its inauguration, as I implicitly 

 believe and as Evelyn put it, awoke in the country the spirit for plant- 

 ing and thereby saved us from invasion in the days of Napoleon, will 

 come to its aid once again and by its powerful support help us to secure 

 that area of home woods which present-day necessities demand, which 

 a full utilization of our national resources and the campaign for thrift 

 in all departments of life equally demand, and which our posterity is 

 likely to so sorely need." 



The author shows in a convincing way in Part I what forestry means 

 to Great Britain. He states that there are 10,400,000 acres of what has 

 been termed idle land in Great Britain, the most of which is suitable 

 for forest growth. There are also 16,500,000 acres of mountain and 

 heath lands, part of which are capable of afforestation. The author 

 states that although before the war Great Britain took approximately 

 half of the world's total imports of forest products, the war's destruc- 

 tion must necessarily react on the forest supplies available in the coun- 

 tries from which she has heretofore drawn her forest products. For 

 many years after the war there will be keen competition for wood on 

 the part of all nations now engaged in it. Great Britain, he states, will 

 be helpless in the timber market because she will have no supplies of 

 her own which if carefully husbanded would have enabled her to tide 

 over the first period of reconstruction. 



The question raised by the author is, How is Great Britain going to 

 set about the afforestation of her large waste areas on a scale commen- 

 surate with her necessities, in order that succeeding generations may 

 not be left entirely at the mercy of foreign countries? 



A brief survey is made of the past history of the afforestation ques- 

 tion in Great Britain and the results of forestation as a paying propo- 



