138 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURATi SOCIETY. 



were established a forest school, and if there were a large Government 

 forest in connection with it, I believe it might be taken advantage 

 of, and be of great service in training young men." — " If there 

 were established a school in connection with some of your large 

 woods in Scotland (for instance, your woods), do you agree with 

 Mr Thomson, who said that the difficulty would be that one pro- 

 jirietor might approve of such an arrangement, and that his successor 

 might not?" "I do not know really that it would be taken 

 advantage of as it ought to be." — " Do you not think, that if you 

 had a forest school on a small scale attached to some of your large 

 woods in Scotland, the proprietor would have this advantage, that it 

 would guarantee that the woods would be thoroughly well worked, 

 and that it would be a guarantee for the scientific management of 

 that particular wood V " 1 believe it would be advantageous." — • 

 " Have you any plan to suggest, short of a Forestry School, as to 

 any smaller school than a Forestry School, at which young forest 

 men, getting from £70 to £80 a year, would receive a better train- 

 ing for their work?" '"I do not think that ordinary school teachers 

 can teach much of the science of forestry." — " They have not been 

 trained themselves, in fact ? " "I do believe that if young men are 

 very well educated, and properly trained, and serve a regular 

 apprenticeship, they would come out very useful foresters for any- 

 thing either at home or abroad." 



** I believe you have nothing farther to tell us about the com- 

 mercial value of the Douglas fir?" "No, I cannot say, because it 

 is a new kind of timber ; it has never been brought into the 

 market, but I have tried it in fencing and for gates and gate-posts, 

 and it has been found to do very well. We had some fine trees 

 blown down about eleven years ago, which I had cut up into fence 

 posts, and they have been put into wire fences. They are still, that 

 is eleven years, in the wire fence, wearing twice as long as Scots fir 

 posts would do." — " You think it is a good quality of wood from 

 what you know?" "I think it is." — "It is not subject to any 

 disease like the larch ? " " It is a tree that is exceptionally free 

 from insects. I do not know a single insect that is peculiar to it." 



" Do you find silver firs worth anything as timber ? " " Yes ; 

 about eleven years ago I could not get reliable information as to 

 how they would last as railway sleepers, from engineers or foremen 

 over the surface men of railways. I got four silver fir sleepers cut, 

 and they were laid on the railway when they were laying sleepers, 

 four miles out from Perth ; they were laying at the same time new 



