14 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



creosoted sleepers have a life of about fifteen years, uncreosoted 

 sleepers have a life of about half that period. I take it, Mr 

 Chairman, that perhaps it would be interesting to your Society 

 if, on the authority of one who has been working specially at 

 the supplies of timber in connection with my own railway — Mr 

 Easton — I gave you some approximate indication of what the 

 uses are to which we apply timber, and what are the sources of 

 supply of this timber at the present time. We use timber on 

 railways for sleepers and for scantlings. We use it for logs, for 

 fencing, telegraph poles, chair keys and waggon sprags, and we 

 also use considerable quantities of ash and other timber when it 

 is available. I heard recently that Sir John Stirling-Maxwell 

 had been at Invergarry, and had suggested that certain birch 

 trees should be cut down with a view to experimenting in their 

 use as sleepers. That I think is a very good suggestion, and 

 it may be a very useful one in the future. The amount of 

 timber we use upon railways in the United Kingdom, as far as 

 I can estimate it, is about 34,000,000 cubic feet in a normal 

 year — that is of finished wood, and you will know how much 

 larger a quantity of round timber that represents. Of that 

 supply, in Scotland we use about 2,400,000 cubic feet which 

 comes from the Baltic and White Sea. We use about 970,000 

 cubic feet of American wood, and 900,000 cubic feet of timber 

 grown at home, also 50,000 cubic feet of teak and other timbers. 

 It is estimated that in England the use of Baltic and White Sea 

 timber in a normal year is 20,000,000 cubic feet; of American 

 timber, 6,500,000 cubic feet; of home-grown, 2,630,000 cubic feet; 

 and of teak and other high-class woods, 350,000 cubic feet. Of 

 home-grown timber you will see we only use about one-tenth in 

 normal times — that is, in pre war times. Let me give as a further 

 instance the case of sleepers. The consumption of sleepers on 

 the lines throughout the United Kingdom is about 54,000,000 a 

 year. That would be about 17,000,000 cubic feet, and a very 

 small proportion of that is derived from British timber. And 

 yet both Scots fir and larch make an equally good sleeper, and 

 I am bound to say that if the railway companies could only get 

 them offered in sufficient quantity on appropriate terms a very 

 large use might be made of them. With regard to white and 

 red pine, deals and battens, these are largely used for waggon 

 building. At present the supply of these almost entirely comes 

 from abroad. Larch and Scots pine would do equally well, and 



