RANSACTI0N8 



OF THE 



ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



I. An Industrial Opportunity.^ 



By John Sutherland, C.B.E., F.S.I. 



Two problems of supreme interest at this moment are the 

 expansion of industry and the scarcity of employment, and both 

 are discussed in vehement and in moderate terms throughout 

 the kingdom. Each has its influence upon every section of the 

 community, and as economic conditions have been completely 

 upset, the necessity for action is more urgent in this country 

 than with probably any other solvent nation. The Government 

 have approached the cities and towns, the Local Authorities, 

 as well as large traffic and industrial companies to inaugurate 

 works for the compulsory idle, and other steps have been taken, 

 such as off"ering drainage and planting grants, to help the work- 

 less ; but swayed by the preponderating voice of the towns, the 

 case of the country rather falls into the shadow, and husbandry 

 takes less hold upon the national imagination. Agricultural 

 policy has often in the past been of the nature of political heart 

 disease, productive of palpitations, sometimes rude and occasion- 

 ally mild, and it cannot claim to have conduced to the complete 

 health or welfare of the rural population. Before our own time 

 and steadily during our generation, there has been a never- 

 ceasing turmoil in connection with the land, and palliatives, 

 often too hurriedly devised, or of the nature of a compromise 

 to meet the views of divergent parties, have time and again 

 only accentuated old grievances or created fresh discontent, 

 with the effect of increasing the troubles of administration. It 



^ An address delivered to the Society at the Annual Meeting, 7th February 

 1923. 



VOL. XXXVII. PART I 4 



