56 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



to arrive at a proper decision, a judge may require some further 

 assistance than he has got from the witnesses in the case, and 

 in such cases he usually exercises the power he possesses to 

 remit any point over which he may have difficulty to one or 

 more independent experts for their opinion. This is practically 

 the same thing as Dr Lauder suggests, and it seems to me to 

 be quite adequate to meet all requirements. 



If a revolution in our legal procedure is necessary in cases 

 of this sort, I doubt if that of the Selby Commission furnishes 

 the object-lesson which Dr Lauder views with so much favour, 

 and I am quite certain it has little to recommend it on the 

 ground of economy. 



7. Employment of Women in Forestry. 



( With Plates.) 



By George Leven. 



The dearth of labour during the last four years has brought 

 the need for "dilutees" in forestry operations, as in other 

 businesses, into prominence. The difficulties in the way of the 

 employment in forestry, on a large scale, of prisoners of war, 

 Belgians or even our own discharged soldiers, latterly turned 

 the search for necessary labour to a source that had only been 

 tapped in a desultory manner previously. The employment of 

 female labour in forestry is, nevertheless, not of recent origin, as 

 seasonal work has always absorbed a certain amount of casual 

 labour, provided by women and girls. The planting out of 

 young trees has long been taken part in, more or less, by young 

 girls, and in the days when oak bark was more made use of 

 than now, foi* tanning purposes, large numbers of women and 

 girls took an active part in all the operations connected with its 

 harvesting. 



The writer has, during a period extending over a quarter of a 

 century, had the supervision of women engaged on estate work 

 of various kinds. As occasion arose they were turned on to 

 forestry work of a light nature, and they generally gave a very 

 good account of themselves. The class of woman employed 

 was usually that brought up in the district and used to agri- 

 cultural work, or, better still, members of the families of estate 

 employees, who had been familiar with the nature of the work 



