2 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORFCULTURAL SOCIETY. 



no connection whatever with any party considerations. It is as a 

 matter of national importance that we wish to put the claims of 

 afforestation before you to-day. The deputation consists of 

 members of the Council of the Royal Scottish Arboricultural 

 Society together with Sir Herbert Maxwell, a former President. 



"I may, perhaps, be allowed to state briefly our claims as a 

 Society to speak on behalf of forestry in Scotland. 



"The Society, which was founded in 1854, has to-day a total 

 of over 1400 members on its books, and includes amongst them 

 those who are engaged in the production and manufacture of 

 timber as well as those who have made a special study of the 

 science of silviculture, so that the Society may justly claim to be 

 the corporate expression of the needs and interests of Scottish 

 forestry and its dependent industries. There is no need to go 

 at length into the early history of the Society, its record is one 

 of constant exertion towards two ends — first, to draw Scottish 

 foresters together and enable them to compare and classify 

 experience brought into the common stock ; and second, to 

 obtain from the State that recognition of and assistance for 

 silviculture which almost every foreign State has long given 

 to it as a great national asset, deserving of development at 

 the hands of the Government. I may say, in passing, that the 

 Society has been more successful in attaining the first object 

 than the second. It has created a solid body of public opinion 

 among Scottish foresters, and accumulated experience of the 

 greatest possible practical value. With regard to State recog- 

 nition or any active assistance in development, we are little 

 better off in 1913 than were our predecessors in 1854. These 

 are strong words. I hope to justify them when I come to the 

 more recent history of our endeavours. 



"In 1895 the Society made the first of a long series of tours 

 in Continental forests, which have been of the greatest edu- 

 ■cational value, and have served, moreover, to bring the Society 

 into close touch with the leading silviculturists of Europe. The 

 Society has spent on these tours at home and abroad no less 

 than ;^96oo, the whole of that sum having been contributed by 

 those who took part in them — the large majority of members 

 attending being always practical foresters. Including these 

 tours, with the sum spent on printing the Transactions, and 

 other expenses, the Society has spent over ^^22,000 in all, 

 directly in the interests of silviculture in Scotland. Next year, 



