THE FOREST RESOURCES OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. ^ 



some of this land a revenue was derived from its sporting 

 capabilities, but much of it carried few or no grouse. Such 

 land was constantly being offered for sale, and, taking the price 

 at twenty-five years' purchase, might be had for from jQtoo to 

 ;^25oo for a thousand acres. He believed the Government 

 paid less than jQ2 an acre for the estate of Inverliever, He 

 supposed that hitherto the working population on that area of 

 13,000 acres consisted of about one shepherd to every 1000 

 acres. Henceforward there could not be less than one wood- 

 man to every 100 acres. Apply that over an annually increasing 

 area, and they would not only convert a revenue of 6d. to 2s. 

 an acre into one of 6s. to iis. an acre, but they would have 

 increased the rural population by 900 per cent. Nor was that 

 all, by any means. Forestry created and supported a host 

 of subsidiary industries. For instance, there was a vast amount 

 of wood in every forest of which at present we could make 

 no use in this country, for coal had supplanted wood as fuel. 

 He believed there were two or three pulping-mills or cellulose 

 factories in England, but they actually imported the soft woods 

 required for pulping, for the simple reason that there were no 

 woodlands in Britain managed on such a system as would ensure 

 the miller a regular supply of raw material. The result upon 

 this country was that we imported from Germany wood-pulp, 

 paper material, and paper manufactured from wood to the value 

 of between eight and ten millions sterling per annum. Every 

 pound of this might be grown and manufactured in this country 

 if we had but the system established. Dealing with the objec- 

 tion that the adoption of a scientific and economic system 

 of forestry would destroy some of the fairest landscapes in the 

 United Kingdom, especially park scenery around country 

 houses. Sir Herbert Maxwell said, that to produce the finest 

 park scenery, the woodland must pass through the stage of 

 close canopy and high-forest. Then, when the crop was 

 mature, they might carve it into landscape according to their 

 fancy. Nor was the process of felling a disfiguring one. In 

 conclusion, the lecturer said he hoped he had shown some 

 reason for the proposition that there was urgent need for 

 strenuous action on the part of the Government before it was 

 too late. The more closely they inquired into the facts, the 

 more clearly they would realise how much they were sacrificing 

 by indifference to the forest resources of the country. 



