202 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



scarcely have believed that we should have made so little 

 advance in Scotland as we have made in these four years. At 

 that time, we were in great hope that a period of advance was 

 beginning, and at the risk of seeming for the moment disloyal to 

 the political party to which I belong, I must honestly say we 

 were receiving from the Liberal Government a measure of 

 encouragement which we never received from a Government 

 of the other complexion. When I remember that this Society 

 really gathers up into its membership practically all the experi- 

 ence of forestry which exists in Scotland, and that as a result 

 of that experience it has tabulated in a perfectly distinct way 

 the proposals necessary for the advance of silviculture, I cannot 

 help feeling that the Scotsmen who in official life represent the 

 country in this matter, whether in Departments or in the 

 Development Commission, have wonderfully little to show for 

 any efforts they may have made on their side. We heard 

 to-day of the open door of the Development Commission. Well, 

 I know that door, and it is a very peculiar piece of furniture. It 

 does undoubtedly stand open, and inside there is a beautiful 

 silence and a beautiful abstention from action of any kind so 

 far as we are concerned. When we approach that open door 

 with any practical proposal, it is invariably slammed in our faces. 

 Of the proposals which this Society has drafted and sent through 

 the Advisory Committee and the Board of Agriculture to the 

 Development Commission, not one has so far been allowed to 

 enter in at that door. They have had no reception except the 

 slamming of it." 



Sir William Haldane : — " Question ! " 



Sir John Stirling-Maxwell, continuing, said : — " I do not wish 

 to speak in a bitter spirit. I admire Lord Lovat for having 

 spoken apart from the party spirit. There may be many roads 

 upon which we may proceed in quest of what we have in view. 

 What we complain of is, that there seems to be no disposition 

 on the part of those in office to advance in any direction. 

 If they do not accept our proposals, it is now ' up to them ' to 

 make some proposal and let us know on what lines they are 

 prepared to encourage some advance. I have nothing more to 

 add, but merely wish to say if there has been any tinge of 

 bitterness in any word I have said, I hope it may be unwritten." 



Mr J. F. Macdonald said : — " I thought Lord Lovat was a little 

 hasty in dismissing the Western Isles. Why do we not grow the 



