2 24 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



communications have been improved and some necessary build- 

 ings have been erected. 



Regeneration is effected partly by natural seeding, and partly 

 by the planting of cleared areas. The rate of growth of the 

 various species is being observed by means of the periodical 

 girth measurement of certain marked trees. An area of 

 55,133 acres is systematically managed in accordance with 

 approved working-plans. 



We congratulate the Government of the States and Mr 

 Burn-Murdoch on the result of the year's work. 



Mahogany. 



Mr C. D. Mell, Assistant Dendrologist, United States 

 Department of Agriculture, writes as follows : — 



" In reading the very interesting paper entitled ' When 

 Afforestation comes,' by Sir John Fleming, LL.D., which 

 appeared in vol. xxiii., Part 2, of the Transactions of the Royal 

 Scottish Arboricultural Society, I observed that a common 

 error among timber merchants and foresters in this country 

 is no less freely propagated in England. I refer to the use of 

 the word " mahogany," which Dr Fleming prefers to use to 

 designate substitutes for real West Indian mahogany {Swieienia 

 mahagoni, Jacq.). This is a monotypic genus, unless Swietenia 

 macrophylla, king of Southern Asia, will finally be accepted 

 as a valid species of this genus. All other woods whose trade 

 names are " mahogany " do not deserve to be called mahogany, 

 any more than alder should be classed with and named birch. 

 Some of the African and South American mahoganies are not so 

 closely related to true mahogany as the alder is to the birch. 

 Yet these substitutes are sold as mahogany. The term 

 mahogany given to certain species of West African woods 

 referred to by Dr Fleming is very general in its application, for 

 there are no less than ten different species of trees in that region 

 that yield timber shipped to England and the United States 

 under the general trade name of African cedar or African 

 mahogany. The noble tree to which Dr Fleming alludes, by 

 saying that it ' is to the forest what the rose is to the garden,' 

 is the West Indian mahogany, and all other woods that 

 resemble it and are now palmed off on the public as such, 

 should, in my opinion, be called by their correct proper names. 



