98 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



but were of opinion that these facts were no justification for 

 any expenditure by Britain. The circumstances are so different 

 in Britain from that of any other country, with the possible 

 exception of Japan, that there are additional arguments for 

 prosecuting afforestation. An island nation should, of all 

 others, at least be partially independent of supplies from outside 

 sources. The Committee added as a reason for abandoning 

 afforestation " the present high rates of interest and wages," but 

 it so happens that since they reported the rate of interest 

 has materially declined and wages have suffered substantial 

 reduction : and both the value of money and of labour is likely 

 to further decrease without much lapse of time. As some 

 indication of apparent want of knowledge of the subject, the 

 Committee enlarge upon the growth of " indigenous " timber, 

 forgetful of the fact that the only indigenous softwood in Britain 

 is the Scots pine, and that, as all silviculturists know, we are 

 dependent upon exotic trees for the best and most rapid returns 

 in forest industries. The Committee were of opinion that land 

 in Scotland should not be acquired for planting because it was 

 too far from industrial areas, but they ignored the fact that it 

 is surely less expensive to ship or rail timber from any part of 

 Scotland to industrial centres throughout Britain than it is to 

 freight wood from Canada and America, France, and other 

 countries. But one of the principal reasons for afforestation, 

 from a national point of view — the proper development of 

 waste land and of ground of little pastoral value — is not 

 mentioned, and forestry after all is the least expensive of all 

 methods of land reclamation. Neither did the Committee 

 apparently give consideration to the importance of afforestation 

 as a rural industry in the hill regions of Great Britain — an 

 element of the utmost consequence in connection with the 

 settlement of people upon the land. 



The Committee's retrograde suggestion that the Forestry 

 Commission should be dissolved and their duties be merged 

 in the Ministries and Boards of Agriculture, would seem to be 

 a merely passing benediction to eliminate questions which 

 would certainly arise in connection with the administration of 

 the lands already acquired and planted with the fullest assent 

 of Parliament. 



The wide national interest in afforestation has been proved 

 to the hilt by the immediate and substantial response which 



