RELATION OF FORESTRY TO AGRICULTURE, ETC. I 23 



altitudes than the good agricultural land which we know 

 in the best agricultural districts — lies at the root of this question 

 of profitable occupation and tillage. 



" Now let me go a little further, and take next the land which 

 is at present grazed, and from that point of view I think we may 

 look at it and see, m the first place, whether the occupation of land 

 for grazing is more or less profitable on the whole than its use for 

 the purpose of growing timber-trees; and, secondly, whether land 

 under pasture employs more or less labour than land used under 

 forest. This labour question is one of the most important. I 

 seem to be reiterating it over and over again, but, believe me, it is 

 one of the points which we must not allow to slip. We must keep 

 it continually before our eyes when we are looking at this question. 

 Now, of course, there are good grazing lands and there are bad. 

 The grazing lands with which I personally have anything to 

 do, and, of course, one can best speak with regard to one's 

 individual experience, I find, do not bring in by any means high 

 rents per acre. I do not think I should be understating it if I 

 said that the average rental of hill grazing suitable for planting 

 in the north-east of Scotland was not above a shilling per acre. 

 Now surely we can make a profit of more than a shilling an acre 

 from trees. As far as I have been able to go into the question, 

 the resultant rental per acre for land of that class, judging from 

 what could be and what has been grown in the past upon it, 

 amounts to at anyrate four or five times that sum. You have 

 therefore got the question of the better use of land which is at 

 present not being utilised to the best advantage, and which I think 

 I am right in maintaining can be utilised to better advantage. 



'•Then comes the question of labour. Forestry certainly 

 employs considerably more labour than grazing. At what do you 

 put the labour employed in grazing even if you add the temporary 

 labour employed for shooting and subsidiary purposes? It does 

 not amount to more than two or three persons at the outside per 

 thousand acres. The average wages paid in the State Prussian 

 forests is given in their return at about iis. 4d. per acre per 

 annum. I think in this country we can safely say that a forest 

 under continuous conditions can absorb a supply of labour 

 equalling a payment of about los. or so per acre per annum. 

 From both points of view which is most profitable to the 

 country? In the first place, you have at present, in certain 

 instances at anyrate, capital being used in an unprofitable way. 



