CHAPTER IV. 







FORESTAL LITERATURE. 



UNIQUE as may be our position among the nations of 

 Europe, in not having either in Britain or in any of our 

 Colonies, a School of Forestry, or provision for the study of 

 Forest Science, beyond arrangements made for candidates 

 for employment in the Forest Service of India, which have 

 been latterly introduced into the College of Engineering 

 at Cooper's Hill, our position is scarcely less unique in 

 regard to forest literature. 



In my Plea for the creation of a School of Forestry in 

 connection with the Arboretum, published in 1877, 

 in illustration of the difference in the amount of literature 

 existing in our language and in the language of Continental 

 Europe, and as indicative of the magnitude of the change 

 which is passing over different lands in which the English 

 language is the language of the people, I asked to be allowed 

 to make the following statement, though in its commence- 

 ment personal to myself: 



' 1 went to the Cape of Good Hope to act as Colonial 

 Botanist in the beginning of 1863. On my arrival I was 

 officially informed that the office had been created some 

 five years before with the two-fold object (I) of ascertain- 

 ing and making generally known the economic resources 

 of the Colony, as regards its indigenous vegetable produc- 

 tions, and its fitness for the growth of valuable exotic trees 

 and other plants ; and (2) of perfecting our knowledge of 

 the flora of South Africa, and thus contributing to the 

 advancement of botanical science. 



' On making my first tour of the Colony to see its flora 

 and its capabilities, I found myself face to face with a 



