CHAP, i.] Forestry in Britain 15 



his appointment ; for no private landowner would entrust the 

 management of his estates to any steward or agent without 

 knowing something about the qualifications and capacity of 

 the latter. Yet no inquiries of this description were made by 

 the Committee ; and appointments to the Department of 

 Woods and Forests still continue to remain in the patronage 

 of the First Lord of the Treasury, under Acts 14 and 15 

 Victoria, chapter 42, section 7, and are in practice more often 

 filled by the appointment of those having influence with 

 politicians, than of men having the best qualifications for the 

 work required of the officers. 



Whether or not our three million acres of woodlands can, 

 by better general knowledge of the natural laws governing 

 tree-growth, be made to yield \, or f , or i % beyond what 

 they now give as a return on the capital represented by 

 the soi\fl/us the growing stock (and the cost of production of 

 which exceeds 20 \ millions of pounds sterling), is surely 

 a matter of considerable national importance. It is by no 

 means advisable, or even justifiable, to pin one's faith to the 

 Laird o' Dumbiedyke's advice to his son, part of which has 

 been adopted as the motto of the Royal Scottish Arboricultural 

 Society : l Jock, when ye hae naething else to do, ye may be aye 

 sticking in a tree; it will be growing, Jock, when ye 're sleeping^? 

 This is in itself fundamentally wrong, for the activity of the 

 chlorophyll of the foliage, and consequently the most active 

 assimilation, can take place only under the influence of sun- 

 light ; whilst all our trees have a long period of winter rest 

 during which even the evergreen conifers merely transpire 

 through their foliage but do not grow. 



1 Waverley Novels, A. & C. Black's edit. 1860, vol. xi. p. 294. If the 

 foot-note accompanying the Laird's advice be actual fact, and not also 

 included in the fiction, then it simply shows how ' enterprises of great pith 

 and moment ' are sometimes lightly embarked on in the crassest and most 

 unthinking ignorance. The judicious formation of plantations is no pastime 

 for an idle holiday; unless knowledge, circumspection, and thought are 

 brought to bear on the subject, it bodes an ill omen for the thriving and 

 ultimate development of the young woods. 



