146 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



They have practically a monopoly of supply, and except at the 

 seaports and large towns, where there is a considerable import 

 in building timber, they have certain fixed prices upon which 

 they can count for years beforehand ; and the Government takes 

 good care that that monopoly is not taken away. These are 

 some of the advantages that the Germans have in growing 

 timber, and that we have not. I am not throwing cold water on 

 what Mr Story has told us, or in the least degree decrying or 

 detracting from the interest of the lecture. But we have got to 

 look at the question from both sides, and not take our ideas 

 merely from the show-places of Germany. It does not do to 

 think of the trees of Scotland from what we see at Murthly and 

 Dunkeld: and I have seen hundreds of places in Germany where 

 the forests were as bad as they are in Scotland. Let us in our 

 own districts, according to soil and situation, consider what is 

 best for them. If we apply German methods indiscriminately 

 we may land our successors in a state of things which they will 

 not bless us for. This is a subject that cannot be discussed 

 thoroughly on such an occasion as this. My own impression is 

 that there is more to be learned by Scottish and English 

 foresters in France and in Denmark than there is in Germany. I 

 think Denmark is where foresters from this country should go, 

 because conditions there are more like those here. 



Mr A. T. Gillanders : — No better educational lecture could, I 

 think, have been brought before us than that to which we have 

 listened from Mr Story. At the same time, I agree with the 

 sentiment which has been expressed, that we must take German 

 principles up to a certain point and no further. We ought to be 

 careful not to become too " German." There are many points to 

 be learned from German forestry, but we must be careful not to 

 become more " German " than the Germans. Two of the errors 

 in this country are that we plant too thinly, and we thin too early. 

 We do not recognise either, as the Germans have recognised, that 

 there is a great advantage to be gained in the pole-stage ; and 

 the non-recognition of the proper principles of mixture is another 

 serious defect in British forestry. There is also to be considered 

 the great question that always crops up before us, that we cannot 

 carry out the sylvicultural principles of the Continent with 

 efficiency and at the same time maintain our woods as game 

 preserves. But I do think that if wood was grown here on a 

 rotation of say 100 years, there would be no better game covers 



