FORESTRY IN SCOTLAND IN THE REIGN OF QUEEN VICTORIA, 131 
Forestry APPLIANCES. 
Here the march of improvements in tools, implements, and 
other Forestry appliances, is perhaps more marked than in any - 
other division of our subject. Even in the shape and quality of 
the commonest articles—the spade, pick, axe, and saw—a great 
improvement has taken place, and the number of new and better 
implements and appliances for performing the various operations 
in Forestry, are seen everywhere in daily use. Hand-tools gener- 
ally are light, clean, and well made of the best materials, and 
specially adapted for every class of work. The implements and 
appliances used for horse-power are far in advance of those 
employed two generations ago, and improvements in their design 
and construction are regularly appearing. 
It is, however, in the domain of mechanical power, and 
contrivances for saving manual and animal labour, that we 
find the greatest advance on pre-Victorian times. The general 
employment of steam as a motive power has been coeval with 
Her Majesty’s reign, and it has worked quite a revolution in all 
branches of Forestry by the cheap and powerful help it supplies. 
Steam is now the motive power of traction engines that can 
haul the heaviest load, with the greatest ease, which our roads 
can carry. It is applied to the heavy work of felling, hauling, 
and sawing of timber; the driving of machinery of every descrip- 
tion for the manufacture of timber, and for its transport by 
railway on land and by steamship at sea. It is also usefully 
employed in clearing land of surface stones and tree roots, and 
reclaiming the soil for tree-planting. It cuts out canals and 
roads, and breaks stones to macadamise the latter. Asa portable 
motive power it still stands unrivalled ; although it is hard to tell 
what electricity may do in the future, when it is better developed, 
to supersede steam. At present it is too costly and unmanage- 
able to enter into serious competition with steam as a motive 
power. As a stationary motor, water is the cheapest of all, and 
might be with great advantage more often employed where steam 
is used. A good head of water and a turbine wheel develop 
great power at little cost for upkeep. The employment of the 
water in our rivers for floating timber from far inland districts to 
seaports has almost become one of the lost arts since the use 
of steam became general in this country. It might easily be 
reorganised and improved, to the advantage of all concerned, 
