THE PLANTING OF WASTE LAND FOR PROFIT. 279 
places within easy communication of these, any great increase 
in the present woodland area throughout the United Kingdom 
must, to be profitable, go hand in hand with the encouragement 
and improvement of existing wood-consuming industries, and 
the creation and fostering of new ones, before it is possible 
that any large investment of national capital in this direction 
is likely to have any fair chance of assuring direct monetary 
profit. Demand creates supply; but supply does not always 
create demand, and this is particularly the case with timber. 
A great impetus would at once be given in this direction 
if the proposed fiscal changes now under consideration should 
ultimately again include an import-duty on all sawn or partially 
converted timber imported from any /oreign country in any 
other shape than round logs or rough-hewn squares. Such a 
change would at once give a great impetus to the saw-mill 
business, and would encourage the growing of wood for profit 
in a way that has never been done since the import-duty was 
entirely taken off imported timber in 1866. This, together with 
facilities for obtaining the loan of the necessary capital on 
easy but fair terms, would be more likely than anything else 
to stimulate planting on a large scale; and it would mean an 
immense addition to the amount spent in the transport and 
milling of timber, in the preparation of cellulose and wood-pulp, 
and in the creation and fostering of industries dependent on 
wood as their raw material. 
A splendid example of extensive and successful planting on 
poor waste land is to be found in the conifer plantations made 
by Earl Fitzwilliam near Rathdrum, Co. Wicklow, during the 
famine years 1847-49, to provide work for some of the starving 
peasantry. The land was poor, and only of nominal value 
for grazing; but the timber-crops, now mature, are worth zz 
situ from £50 to over £60 an acre (part was actually sold 
in 1903 at £63 an acre), while they have at different times 
given very fair returns from thinnings. The entire removal 
of timber-duties, in 1866, of course struck a hard blow at this 
desirable sort of enterprise, and no compensating inducements 
have yet been offered by Government to encourage landowners 
to plant. 
7. What would be the National-Economic Effect of Planting 
Waste Lands extensively ?—This has partially been indicated 
in the last paragraph above, but the following comparison of 
