I40 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
to reap, and therefore he has to be the more careful that he 
lays out capital judiciously. It is true, as a general rule, that 
the larger your concern the more economical is your manage- 
ment; but this holds good only up to a certain point, and I feel 
pretty confident that one hundred individuals will manage 
100,000 acres of timber-crop, spread all over the country, better 
and more economically than the State could do. I throw out this 
suggestion with all deference to your knowledge and experience. 
If, on considering it, which I trust you and others may be 
disposed to do, you conclude that it is worthy of advancement, 
it lies with you, by conversation and suggestion with your whole 
circle of acquaintances, to give it more prominence. 
On the subject of the aiding of prospective planters, I wish to 
bring two points to your notice. First—the Rabbit. Fully as 
destructive as the squirrel (as to the method of dealing with 
which I refer you to our last issue of Zvansactions), this 
animal has caused much harm and ill-feeling all over Great 
Britain. But while the squirrel has only his charm and beauty 
to excuse his existence, there is something else to be said for 
the rabbit. Reduced to soup, he is much appreciated by many 
people in cases of age or illness; properly associated with an 
onion, he may even be said to be popular; and many people 
enjoy a day’s rabbiting. I must say I like him to eat, I like to 
have him to give away, and I like shooting at him; but, except 
on these occasions, I never wish to see the little brute again. 
At present he is pretty well ubiquitous, and one of the main 
causes which retards the formation of plantations. That is to 
say, if it were not for the cost of having to wire-net a new 
plantation, the same outlay would plant nearly double the 
ground ; and even when you have wire-netted, it is marvellous 
how one or two will get in, and the damage they can do if not 
immediately killed off. It is the same with agriculture. It is 
wonderful how much harm a very few rabbits in a wood 
bordering on a field of turnips can do when the neeps are just 
coming through the ground, and again later in the year if hard 
weather comes on before the crop is pulled. Equally he fouls 
grass land, so that both sheep and cattle loathe it. In plain 
words, he is a nuisance to “ culturalists” of every kind, and being 
so easily caught and marketed, is apt to tempt some thoughtless 
lads and lead them on to a path which frequently ends in worse 
results than the simple taking of a few rabbits. But for all 
