Io8 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETV. 



dry sandy soil. There is a great deal of talk about the Douglas 

 pine, but in West Lothian it does not thrive at all. It may do 

 in Perthshire, but it will not do here. The black Italian poplar 

 is another tree that gives a large quantity of wood in a short 

 time. We want to get large quantities of wood for pulping after 

 the war, and, of course, poplars do not produce wood of a very 

 good quality, but they are perfectly good for pulp. In this country 

 we are very wasteful in many ways. We cut down trees and 

 never use the roots. When I was a student in Germany, I took a 

 great interest in the way they cut the trees in the Harz Mountains. 

 They cleared the ground completely and tore up the roots and 

 sold them as cordwood to the people in the neighbourhood for 

 fuel. By and by if coal gets dear in price, which it very likely 

 will, we ought to utilise the roots in this country and not leave 

 them to rot. If there is no local demand for firewood it might 

 well be used for distillation, and tar can be made out of it. 

 There is a great deal of ground in West Lothian that should 

 be used for growing wood on — the immense spent shale bings 

 round the oil works, and on bings at abandoned oil works. 

 The proprietors, if they were sensible men, would have these 

 waste bings planted up, but many of them are very far from 

 sensible — they are extremely stupid and very ignorant of the 

 elements of afforestation. They care nothing about it, and 

 the sooner they are told about it the better. These shale 

 bings on the various estates are an eyesore, and a great waste 

 of good land that is continually growing worse. Most of them 

 are enormous flat-topped artificial mountains, shaped like Table 

 Mountain at Cape Town, and they might be covered with 

 various kinds of trees that would grow there. Some have been 

 standing there for thirty years growing nothing but what grows 

 naturally. If a little seed had been sown on the top of the 

 older bings some years ago it would now be growing, and these 

 bings might be developing into a forest-clad range of mountains 

 by this time." 



Mr Robert Allan said : — " I suggest to Mr Cadell that he 

 should come to Mr Robertson-Durham's estate and see the 

 top of a bing planted there, and he will see the success of it." 



Mr Cadell. — " If Mr Allan would come to other parts of 

 West Lothian he would get more benefit." 



The Chairman (to Mr Allan). — " Have you any experience?" 



Mr Allan. — " Mr Robertson-Durham did it, and it was quite 



