NATIONAL AFFORESTATION 



and quite forgotten to establish. Then, too, 

 we found out that whereas France and Ger- 

 many had half an acre of woodlands per head 

 of the population, Britain could barely average 

 a fifth of that amount. 



Early historians tell us that in their day, 

 not only England, but the greater part of the 

 British Isles, was forest land; but as time 

 progressed and the population increased, the 

 calls for timber gradually reduced the area 

 and density, until to-day the sum total 

 of our woodlands is less than 3,000,000 acres 

 out of a total of 77,000,000 acres. The 

 South of England was particularly well 

 wooded, trees and underwood extending in an 

 almost unbroken line from east to west, while 

 both the Midlands and North had their de- 

 tached forests. Remnants of the southern 

 woodlands are Epping, Richmond, Windsor, 

 and the New Forest, while Sherwood, with its 

 memories of Robin Hood, was one of the best- 

 known and most valuable of the earlier forest 

 lands. Scotland had its great Caledonian 

 Forest, while the famous Shillelagh and other 



22 



