112 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Take our sycamore. Substitutes have been tried from all the 

 different countries in the world to take its place for cotton- 

 bleaching work, but nothing gives the same results and the 

 same lasting quality. Last Wednesday I met a bobbin 

 manufacturer who does a fairly large business in the manufacture 

 of bobbins for the Calcutta market, and he told me that they are 

 likely to lose that market because the Japanese can send them 

 in at a much lower cost. I said, ' Now, how do you think that 

 this Japanese bobbin is going to take?' He said, 'As far as I 

 know,' — and he had a son representing the firm in Calcutta — 

 * the Japanese wood is more brittle than our own ; the birch is 

 the preferable wood.' Now, every man who has ever gone round 

 the West of Scotland knows that there are, not merely acres but 

 square miles of scrub birch. It is a disgrace to the afforestation 

 of this country that, through lack of a little care, we have not 

 been raising and utilising enormous quantities of birch. Take 

 the birch bobbins required by our great thread works. The bulk 

 of these bobbins come from Norway and Sweden. They should 

 all be produced at home. Take even our beech. There is not 

 a tree in this country that is more beautiful, I daresay, but 

 through want of proper silvicultural treatment, and where it has 

 been grown for its beauty only, you may get a fine short stem 

 about lo or 15 feet long with about 2 tons in it, then 5 tons of 

 top the removal of which very often costs more than it is worth. 

 "As to Mr Cadell's reference to the roots, I am very sorry to 

 say that Scottish folk have not sufficiently awakened to the need 

 of thrift. I have burned many tons of brushwood this year. 

 You would need to cart it to the doors of the consumers and put 

 it on their fire before they would use it. What we want is to 

 keep going at our Prime Minister, who evidently takes a great 

 interest in afforestation, and sees the great necessity for plant- 

 ing and planting largely. There are any number of acres in the 

 isolated corners of this country that would grow beautiful 

 hardwood, even beautiful conifers, but they are left barren 

 wastes because, even if they are planted up, before they are 

 2 feet high, the trees are killed by rabbits. You will never 

 grow trees and rabbits together. The question is whether 

 rabbits or trees are better worth preserving. This country could 

 have sustained nearly one-third more, or one-half more, of its 

 population in afforestation than it is doing to-day if we had only 

 gone the right way about it. I think it is a great national asset 



