30 FORESTRY IN 



works on forestry in the Spanish language of lateyears, which 

 I have noted, I may remark that this did not occur until 

 after several successive batches of students had entered upon 

 the active duties of their profession. It was then that it 

 became manifest wherein the existing forestal literature 

 of the country was deficient in view of the requirements 

 of the day ; and that the desire for information induced 

 purchase and perusal. " And it is noteworthy that even 

 still in connection with the publication of almost all of the 

 Spanish works referred to, including the most expensive 

 and least popular of them, the writers were relieved of 

 the expense of publication. It is not so with us. 



To quote again from my " Plea for the Establishment 

 of a School of Forestry in connection with the Arboretum 

 in Edinburgh":- 



' I have been asked How has it come to pass that so 

 little has been done in Britain, while so much has been 

 done on the Continent of Europe, to raise up a body of 

 foresters, highly educated for the discharge of their duties? 

 My answer must be Hitherto the problem to be solved 

 in Britain did not require the amount of information 

 which was required for the solution of the complicated 

 problems demanding solution there. On the Continent 

 they were threatened in many quarters with a lack of 

 fuel, with a lack of timber, with ruinous desiccation, and 

 with destructive torrents, all consequent on the destruction 

 of their forests, and with the devastation of fertile lands 

 by drift sands, which could only be arrested and utilised 

 by the planting of trees. In Britain we find fuel in our 

 coal mines, and in many country districts in our peat 

 bogs ; excepting for a short time about the beginning of 

 the present century, when war was raging, we could get 

 timber of every description from beyond the sea; and we 

 know little of drought, of torrents, and of drift sands, and 

 the difference has even told upon our language. While 

 our French neighbours speak of Sylviculture, the culture 

 of woods, we speak of Arboriculture, the culture of trees. 



