6o TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOmSH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



delay and hesitation along others. There is more machinery 

 than ever before, more money being spent. The effort must 

 now be to so balance the effort as to keep the cart behind the 

 horse. What is needed is organisation, co-ordination, and the 

 doing of first things first." 



This might well have been written in regard to the present 

 position of forestry in Scotland. 



6. Continental Notes — France. 



By A. G. Hobart-Hampden. 



I. As at home, so abroad, there is great discussion as to the 

 advisability or otherwise of using seed from foreign countries. 

 In particular the seed of Scots pine from Auvergne, where in 

 that mild and regular climate seeding is profuse, has been very 

 severely criticised in Germany, and M. Huffel has set himself to 

 consider whether the criticism is justified. Possibly it began in 

 trade rivalry, the French seed being very cheap, but foresters of 

 note, from whom careful statements may be expected, have 

 proved beyond doubt that the results of using foreign seed have 

 often been most disastrous. Thus Dr Schwappach states that 

 hundreds of acres of Scots pine grown from French seed have 

 utterly failed at lo to 15 years of age. Russian foresters have 

 found that their plantations of Scots pine grown from German 

 seed have failed at 20 to 30 years, and the Swedes have 

 had a similar, and very marked, experience. Also in Prussia the 

 French plants suffered badly from " leaf shedding " {rouge, 

 schutie). At the same time the French plants have done well 

 in Austria, Switzerland and Belgium. M. Huffel thinks that the 

 cause of the disaster in Prussia may have been the habit of 

 forwarding the cones from Auvergne before they are ripe (to 

 prevent loss of seed in transit), and the consequent necessity 

 of subjecting them on arrival to great heat. 



Incidentally, M. Huffel writes in a most interesting way of the 

 transmissibility of the characteristics of the various races of the 

 Scots pine. This species ranges from Lapland to Spain, and 

 varies, as M. Huffel says, as much as does a Lapp fisherman from 

 a Basque mountaineer. He quotes many experiments showing 

 that the seed of any variety, wherever sown, invariably produces 



