l82 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



wood should yield about loo tons (5000 c. ft.) of timber per acre. 

 Personally, I see no reason for questioning Dr Schlich's 

 estimates, though I prefer to make, at the outset, some 

 deduction for possible disasters. Dr Nisbet accuses the 

 Commissioners of, whilst quoting many examples of profitable 

 forestry in Britain, deliberately suppressing all mention of dead 

 failures, a charge which, however, is hardly substantiated by 

 facts, for, in paragraph 21 of the Report, failures in abundance 

 are acknowledged ; and a study of the evidence which the 

 Commissioners had before them shows that such failures were 

 in many instances due to avoidable causes, such as attempting 

 to cultivate trees in lands unfit for any forestry work, the faulty 

 selection of species or wrong methods of cultivation, and I 

 consider that they were right in basing their calculations of 

 future possibilities on successes only. 



The (doubtlessly reliable) data, regarding the financial 

 success of forest management in various German states, which 

 the Commissioners quote as an additional base of their forecasts, 

 are, as Dr Nisbet points out, not applicable in this respect, not 

 because social, climatic, or geological conditions would render 

 such comparisons unjustifiable, but because they refer to large 

 forest areas of which afforested waste lands form but a small 

 part. Dr Nisbet suggests that a comparison with the results 

 of the extensive afforestation schemes carried out in Prussia 

 since the middle of last century would be rnore to the point. 

 I do not agree with this, for these figures would embrace the 

 numerous and heavy losses incurred during the prolonged period 

 of successive failures, and thereby give the impression that the 

 afforestation of waste lands is under all circumstances an 

 unprofitable undertaking. That this, however, is by no means 

 the opinion in Prussia, is evidenced by the fact that the 

 Government bought 213,710 acres of waste land in the twenty 

 years 1883-1903, and 59,058 acres in the following five years, 

 and cultivated 237,574 acres during these twenty-five years. 

 They still own some 64,000 acres of waste land fit for 

 afforestation, and their working-scheme provides for an annual 

 afforestation of from 10,000 to 12,000 acres, with the purchase 

 of similar areas for an indefinite period Afforestation of waste 

 lands by private owners and village communities is, at the 

 same time, actively encouraged. Associations with this end 

 in view are formed under the patronage of Government, and 



