176 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
be said of the Windsor Forest, and of the Forest of Dean in 
Gloucestershire, as well as of others in Scotland. 
It will easily be understood that the countries in which 
civilisation advanced with the most rapid strides were those from 
which the natural forests disappeared the soonest; and at the 
present time these islands have a smaller percentage of wood- 
producing area than is found in any other European country, with 
the solitary exception of Denmark. The actual proportion is as 
follows :— 
tussia, . . 40 per cent. Greece, . - 14 per cent. 
Sweden, . . 934 - Spain, . a re ap 
Norway, . SPUQIEL s,, Belgium,. een => 
Germany, <wa26 33 Holland,. if a 
Turkey, . 22 - Portugal, 5 sf 
Switzerland, . 18 a British Isles, 4 Re 
France, 17 Me Denmark, oye Gn 
The average is 29} per cent., and includes orchards and isolated 
trees in parks, hedgerows, and elsewhere. 
Countries which, like ours, have a very small wooded area of 
their own, have to supplement their home-grown supplies of 
wood from other countries which are still able to produce more 
of this commodity than their population can consume ; and, on 
reference to Dr Schlich’s Manual of Forestry [which I shall very 
often have occasion to refer to, and on the general lines of which 
I propose to direct this course of lectures], I find that the United 
Kingdom annually imports— 
Timber to the value of about . f .  £15,000,000 
Minor forest produce to the value of about £8,000,000 
Total, about £23,000,000 . 
These facts have not, up to the present time, led to any very 
great amount of inconvenience. /%rstly, because our insular 
position affords us great facilities for the importation of timber; 
secondly, because we have a plentiful supply of coal ; thirdly, 
because our climate does not demand modifications of the nature 
which extensive forests are able to effect, nor do we, as a rule, 
suffer from any deficiency of the water-supply in our wells, 
springs, and streams; and fowrthly, the geological formation and 
the configuration of these islands, and the climatic conditions 
