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forest trees, together with notes of their age when eligible for 

 various timber purposes : 



Beech ... ... ... 60-110 years. 



Hornbeam... ... ... 70-100 



Oak ... ... . 70-120 



Alder ... ... ... 30-80 



Birch ... ... ... 40-70 



Silver Fir ... ... ... 60-150 



Norway Spruce ... ... 60-150 



Scotch Fir... ... ... 30-60 



Larch ... ... ... 30-80 * 



That, however, in our winterless zone, such of these trees 

 as will endure a warmer clime would advance with more 

 quickness to maturity, must be readily manifest. The accurate 

 Customs returns for the last year show an importation of 

 foreign woods to the value of 223,769; there was scarcely 

 any export. This very month the imported building wood 

 sent to Sandhurst alone has cost 58,000. Some countries 

 have not been altogether unmindful of the conservation of 

 their forests. Germany, already much devastated at the time 

 of the Romans, received its first forest laws as far back as the 

 reign of Charlemagne indeed with the commencement of 

 agriculture and the settling of the nomadic hunter on fixed 

 habitations. The forests thus discontinued to be common pro- 

 perty, and in the fourteenth century commenced already a 

 forest economy. Full legislation, regular management and 

 actual cultivation of trees on an extensive scale, date back 150 

 years. Venice formed its forest laws already in the fifteenth 

 century. Although the desire for ample hunting territory 

 gave a great impulse to the restrictions placed on the encroach- 

 ment of the Middle European forests, this at the same time 

 saved them to the country. 



Within the operations of wood culture may also be included 

 that of subduing drift-sand, and solidifying the latter finally 



* It should be remembered that most of our forest ranges are 

 naturally devoid of pinewood, only one species of callitris occurring 

 in a few limited mountain districts, while our second callitris is a 

 desert species. Without coniferous trees of our own we shall finally 

 experience difficulty of obtaining the required supply of deals, pitch, 

 turpentine and pine-resin. Doubtless for many wood-structures 

 now iron is substituted, but even a ship or a house cannot be buiit 

 entirely of iron, and the very production of the iron is dependent on 

 fuel. In the absence of coal, the use of iron, involving here an ex- 

 penditure for heavy freight, must necessarily be limited. 



