174 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



If estate owners condescend to profit by recent experiences 

 they, or their successors, will not be taken by surprise by the 

 next visitation of abnormal gales, but, on the contrary, will be 

 ready to turn the results to the best account. 



Those owners, on the other hand, who shut their eyes to 

 obvious lessons will find themselves sooner or later in the 

 position of a city merchant of my acquaintance who purchased 

 an estate a number of years ago, regarding the trees on it as 

 so many appendages, only to be removed, like furniture or 

 table ornaments, at the will and pleasure of the owner. This 

 worthy city man had never realised that trees, like other 

 productions of nature aided by art, require continual attention 

 and renewal. Accordingly, when the floods came and the winds 

 blew and beat upon those trees, they fell — and great was the 

 havoc of their fall. A neighbouring wood-merchant, called to 

 the rescue, after surveying several acres of tangled branches and 

 broken tree-trunks, was obliged to explain to my poor city friend 

 — who abominates a bad bargain — that the labour and expense 

 of clearing the ground would amount to more than the remain- 

 ing sound timber would be worth. Thus, for want of skilled 

 attention and foresight during the fat years, when the lean year 

 came the owner found that he had lost not only his trees but 

 also their money value. 



21. The State Forests of Saxony. 



(IVif/i llhi St rations.) 

 By A. D. HoPKiNSON. 



Position. — The kingdom of Saxony lies on the western 

 border of the German Empire, and is bounded on the south- 

 west by Bohemia, while Prussia, Thuringia and Bavaria form 

 the other neighbouring states. 



Physical Features. — Although flat and dry in the north, the 

 eastern and southern parts of Saxony are hilly and even 

 mountainous, and well watered by streams running down from the 

 Erzgebirge — a range of mountains forming the chief physical 

 feature of the country. It is on the well-watered hills forming 

 the northern slope of the Erzgebirge that are situated the 

 finest of the spruce forests, while towards the north, owing to 



