2 12 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAI, SOCIETY. 



class, who have no draught cattle and therefore have to pay 

 their better placed neighbours for the hire for ploughing, etc., 

 either in money or by labour. They can no longer pay the 

 high rent and live in the country ; they are forced to emigrate. 

 The Forest Department, on verifying these facts, decided in 1889 

 to lease to each forest labourer about two acres of cultivable 

 land, within the forest boundaries, at reduced rates, averaging 

 50 per cent, of those obtainable in the open market, and to 

 grant further concessions in respect of pasture, minor forest 

 products, etc., so long as the participants in these favours were 

 willing to work in the forest during the periods of felling and 

 of cultivation, on the payment of full rates. Most satisfactory 

 success has been obtained under this plan, at a reasonable cost, 

 and in 1907-8, 15,919 workmen had already been secured. 

 The contracts, which are not limited to the mere labourers, but 

 extend to small proprietors who are willing to work in the 

 forest either themselves or with their horses, run for six or 

 twelve years, but there is no question that they will ever be 

 repudiated by the employer. The scheme is still growing, but 

 is naturally limited by the number of domiciles available in 

 villages near enough to cultivable land within the forest 

 areas, and not too far from forest work, for even now, in the 

 eastern provinces, labourers have frequently to be driven to 

 their work. 



Many, many years ago, when regular forest management was 

 first introduced into sparsely populated districts, the authorities 

 were forced to build habitations, which were let to forest 

 labourers at a nominal rent ; but a time arrived when the 

 population in the country increased, in excess of agricultural 

 requirements, and labour became plentiful and cheap. The 

 Forest Department then abandoned the policy of providing 

 houseroom, and most of the cottages were pulled down. There- 

 after a period set in when industries began to indent on 

 agricultural labour. The movement towards manufacturing 

 centres was in the beginning slow, and attracted no serious 

 attention, but it grew with the force and rapidity of an 

 avalanche, till now it threatens to sweep away the very vitality 

 of the open country. The seriousness of the case, as affecting 

 forest administration, was first recognised in 1873 ; but beyond 

 stopping any further demolishment of workmen's huts, nothing 

 was done for years. The number of such cottages amounted 



