RECLAMATION OF WASTE LAND. 429 



vast areas of land, which after all possess not a little pro- 

 ductive faculty — for the forester of Dunrobin has given it 

 in evidence that the finest forest that he has seen was grown 

 on soil that was quite unfit for ordinary cultivation — 

 Alfred de j\Iusset has sung, bewaiHng the wasteful destruc- 

 tion going on — 



" Notre globe ras, sans barbe et sans cheveux 

 Comme un gros potiron roulera dans les cieux." 



Most attention is due to this kind of land, not only because 

 in it the waste incurred by past neglect is greatest and least 

 excusable, but also because the work of reclamation is in 

 this case bound to take the longest time. There is waste 

 here with a vengeance, waste which the Coast Erosion 

 Commission has estimated at nine million acres. And to 

 this, so it is sad to have to own, must be added large areas 

 of land actually covered with trees, and rejoicing in the 

 name of woodland, but which, owing to neglect and false 

 forestry, really represents little more than absolute waste 

 — with too Uttle timber upon it, and much of that worth 

 very little as timber, though it may be highly useful as 

 cover for game — " gappy woods, stunted growth and short 

 coarse stems far apart," so an expert forester has described 

 it before the Forestry Committee. Look at that wood- 

 land — a good part of the three million acres that we actually 

 possess ! It looks pretty enough to the untutored eye, 

 picturesque in its wildness, but a large portion of it is worth 

 very little indeed. The timber stands either too thick or 

 too thin. Underwood, which at present is a drug in the 

 market, is plentiful, but good stems are few. The best 

 have been cut down to raise money. In the words of a 

 witness before the Forestry Committee — " On a great many 

 estates in Scotland it is the lawyer in Edinburgh who says, 

 ' you must sell a certain amount of timber or, at any rate, 

 you must fetch me so much money, and you have to get it.' " 

 What few stems there are are either gouty at the foot or 

 spiky at the top, over-ripe, bent, gnarled, whiskered and 

 full of " shakes." Not a Httle of that neglected land has 

 in the past generations been under trees, and good trees too, 



