6 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



IS. per acre = ;^i25o, so that the assessable value of the parish 

 would be reduced by the sum of ^4145. As on the present 

 valuation of ;!r 11,450 it takes a rate of 3s. 3d. on owners and 

 3s. on occupiers to produce the amount necessary to maintain 

 the poor, the schools, the roads, etc., it is easy to calculate how 

 greatly the rate would have to be increased if the valuation were to 

 be reduced to ;^7305 ; and as the outlay on these local require- 

 ments is an ever-increasing quantity, one realises what a heavy 

 burden on the crofters, shopkeepers, and householders such an 

 experiment would entail. 



It seems to me that it would be more profitable to the 

 community if owners of estates could be encouraged to plant 

 areas in different places, which, under estate management, could 

 be done without disturbing existing sources of valuation to any 

 appreciable extent, rather than to endeavour to afforest in big 

 blocks under a national scheme. 



There is a premium offered at present against planting — as 

 long as an owner occupies his land with sheep he only pays 

 rates on three-eighths of its valuation. If he fences and plants 

 it, he has to pay rates on the full value appearing in the Valua- 

 tion Roll. 



In addition to the rating question as affecting the local rate- 

 payer, the further point arises as to whether the afforestation of 

 the whole area would provide employment for a greater 

 population than it does under its present conditions, when one 

 thinks of those who would disappear — sheep farmers, shepherds, 

 gamekeepers, ghillies, gardeners, caretakers, considered along 

 with the greatly reduced employment given to carpenters, slaters, 

 masons, painters, plumbers, and all such tradesmen, in 

 maintaining the buildings, water supplies, paths, etc., inseparable 

 from shootings and sheep farms. Eventually no doubt it would, 

 but I fear not in the time of the present generation. 



These remarks do not apply to a parish where the whole area 

 is capable of afforestation, and of course the reduction in the 

 assessable value of a parish which I hav^ brought out above 

 is not a reduction which would occur all at once. The whole 

 area could only be planted gradually : and if the planting was 

 done very gradually it might be possible to open up some of the 

 planted ground to deer and sheep before the whole of the 

 wintering ground had been planted, and so to provide them with 

 shelter. This, however, could not be earlier than fifteen years 



