110 
together with badly placed trees. (raps, so caused, are filled up 
1 
considerations in determining the price, but such items as whether 
the timber is sold standing or felled ; its distance from a good road 
and manufacturing centre, and whether it can be partly worked on 
the ground, are all subjects which help to determine its value. 
Trees of small girth are sometimes well sold at from sixpence to 
ninepence a cubic foot, while trees with a large quarter girth have 
been known to reach half-a-crown a cubic foot in the neighbourhood 
of Chesham. The most frequent price for medium sized, clean 
grown trees would appear to be from one shilling to one shilling 
and sixpence a cubic foot. 
Of the several towns where an outlet is found for beech timber, 
High Wycombe is perhaps the most important. As a centre for 
chair-making it is of world-wide fame, whilst general cabinet work 
and numerous minor industries are also established there. Beech 
timber enters largely into these various industries, and it is of 
special importance in the manufacture of chairs, though of late 
years a rival has sprung up in imported birch which arrives partly 
worked. Windsor chairs, with the exception of the seats, are made 
of beech, and many of the commoner upholstered chairs are also 
made from the same kind of wood. 
Formerly, a considerable amount of work in preparing the wood 
for chair-making, such as the turning of legs, spindles, &c., was 
carried out in the woods; the articles being put together in 
factories and shops in the surrounding towns and villages. fen 
from these places found work in the woods for the greater part of 
the year, and in some cases bothies were erected for the accommo- 
dation of those men whose homes were too far distant to allow of 
their return each evening. For some years past, however, this 
practice has been gradually dying out, for the competition with 
machine-made articles and imported wood, already partly worked, 
