262 THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRITISH FORESTRY 



posts were practically sinecures, the lower were filled b}' 

 a type of men not above increasing their moderate 

 salaries by dishonest means. Paragraph 14 of the Report 

 of the Select Committee on Crown Forests, sitting in 1854, 

 reads : 



' The division of responsibility between the Com- 

 missioners and the Treasury, established by the 14 

 and 15 Vict. c. 42, has not worked well. A surveyor- 

 general of practical experience, the appointment of whom 

 is provided for by the twelfth section of the said Act, 

 should have the superintendence of the whole of the 

 forests, Avhich he should frequently visit, and be re- 

 sponsible for carrying out all necessary details, through 

 competent deputy-surveyors under him. These deputy- 

 surveyors should also be practically acquainted with 

 forest affairs, and the place of deputy-surveyors should 

 not be given, as it sometimes has been, to persons wholly 

 ignorant of the management of woodlands.' 



Between indifference and neglect on the part of the 

 superiors, and breaches of trust on the part of the sub- 

 ordinates, and a large measure of incompetence common 

 to both classes, the Crown woods became a source of 

 ridicule to the practical forester instead of an example 

 of good forestry, and a young man anxious to improve his 

 knowledge would as little think of going to the Crown 

 forests as a farm pupil of going to the Highlands of 

 Scotland, or the west coast of Ireland. 



In recent years this dejjartment has, however, given 

 signs of life to the extent of stretching itself and yawning. 

 The stretch resulted in the purchase of Inverliever, the 

 yawn in the creation of a school for working foresters in 

 the forest of Dean. Small as these efforts are, they show 

 the first indication of an active forest policy which may 

 be something definite if vigorously pursued. Nothing 

 more is needed than the improvement of the woods 



