no TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



might be adjusted by the repayment of capital expended on the 

 crop with 3 per cent, compound interest, while the mature crop 

 would be taken over at its sale value as fixed by a valuator 

 approved by both parties. The term " immature crop " might 

 be taken to mean all crops which have not attained one-half the 

 age of commercial maturity. 



" Applications from landowners should be addressed to the 

 Board of Agriculture for Scotland. Details of the area concerned 

 should be clearly shown on Ordnance Survey sheets, and present 

 rental values with public and parish burdens should be specified. 

 Those offers will be given the preference which afford opportunity 

 for leasing at the present time areas up to looo acres in 

 extent, with the prospect of extending the leased area to 4000 or 

 5000 acres as afforestation progresses ; but, owing to the great 

 variation in local conditions, the Board of Agriculture will be 

 prepared to receive communications from all interested parties 

 and to discuss proposals generally in accordance with the above 

 principles." 



With reference to the above Memorandum the President has 

 sent the following letter to the Secretary for publication : — 



" i^th December 19 14. 

 " Dear Mr Galloway, — 



"The memorandum issued by the Board of Agriculture for 

 Scotland and described by the Board as outlining proposals for 

 the afforestation of land in private ownership, is, even for a 

 skeleton, meagre and incomplete. We can recognise in it 

 characteristics to v/hich we have become accustomed in the 

 Board's dealings with silviculture, and a single new note which 

 deserves more careful examination than the space of a letter can 

 afford. Let us run over the familiar features — 



" I. The old device, with which the first paragraph begins, of 

 taking cover behind the Development Commissioners, as if the 

 Board of Agriculture for Scotland had no mind or will of its own 

 in a matter of vital interest to the poorer parts of the country. 



" 2. The nervous horror of doing anything that may remotely 

 and indirectly benefit landowners — well illustrated by 



" 3. The old old story that the landowner is to receive no rent 

 for his land, and no return from it, until the sales of forest produce 

 may begin — i.e. the weaker partner is to bear the whole of any 

 loss of income that afforestation may entail. 



