202 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
Free Trade M.P., in the Report to be laid before the House of 
Commons, quoting, as an example of the results of “good 
management,” what he must then have personally known to be 
partly due to Protection; for it would be quite absurd to pretend 
that both the maintenance of the local monopoly in and around 
Anthonsthal, and the financial benefit thereby obtained, were 
not affected by the levying of ax import duty amounting to nearly 
8 per cent. [(35 x 54) : 18. 24d. :: 100 : 7°78] plus extra-haulage 
for a distance of at least 3% miles, and probably usually much 
farther. To attempt to maintain that so high an ad valorem 
duty as 8 per cent., further increased by the additional cost of 
extra-haulage, on such a bulky and heavy raw material as timber, 
can count for little or nothing in the Anthonsthal balance-sheet 
would really be stating something that no unprejudiced person is 
likely to believe. Whatever the intention, however, the citation 
of Anthonsthal is clear evidence that Protection can and does 
there add in no small degree to the profit of timber-growing. 
As to Protection with regard to timber-growing in Britain, I 
have never advocated it. Timber is such a heavy and bulky raw 
material, and so much of it gets wasted as sawdust, etc., during 
conversion, that it is one of the least suitable of raw products on 
which to levy an import duty. But the fact remains, that the 
complete abolition of the import duties on foreign timber in 1860 
dealt the death-blow to the planting of waste land in the United 
Kingdom. In speaking of “Protection, a policy which, in the 
form of Colonial Preference, failed to promote sylviculture up to 
forty years ago,” Mr Munro Ferguson is confusing various 
economic factors; but it is certain that duty-free imports since 
1860, and increase of the burdens on land and plantations since 
then, have effectually prevented landowners from planting for 
profit. And, while on this subject, I may state my personal 
opinion here, that, if we can possibly obtain from Canada a 
preference for her exports of timber, wood-pulp, and paper made 
from wood, it will be of great advantage to Britain in the future. 
In conclusion, I would ask Mr Munro Ferguson to read and 
consider the opinion of his own estate factor, Mr Meiklejohn, about 
Anthonsthal, when he visited it in June 1904 with Dr Schlich’s 
party (see Transactions, Vol. XVIII., 1905, page 158) :— 
“To me this forest was particularly interesting. It extends 
over the same area as is covered by the Novar Woods, and the 
plan of cutting so many acres annually is in accordance with 
