RECLAINIATION OF WASTE LAND. 447 



shall never have, and we do not want, a large semi-military 

 posse of forest officers like Germany. And as for practice, 

 climate and soil, as well as general conditions, make a 

 material difference. We cannot here talk of the evergreen 

 oak, the cork oak and the Aleppo pine (pinus lialipensis) 

 on which French foresters so much rely in the South of 

 their country. Also, as Mr. V. F. Leese has well pointed 

 out, in his lecture already alluded to, French underplanting, 

 which answers so well in France, and w^hich is so much 

 fancied by some of our owners of forests, is altogether out 

 of place in this country of less sunshine and more humidity, 

 resulting in denser canopies and the undergrowth kept 

 short of the necessary light. We should, moreover, remember 

 that, just as we intend to do, other countries are proposing 

 to set their forestal houses in order. We may some time 

 hence look for a considerable increase in yield of timber in 

 Russia. And there is an enormous forest wealth now growing 

 up under very judicious management in India, which will, 

 on its arriving at a felling age, make a perceptible difference 

 to the w^orld's annual output of timber. 



Such bettering of other countries must prove all to 

 our advantage. For even if we plant all the 12,000,000 

 acres that the Erosion Commission places to our credit, 

 we shall never be able to produce on our native soil all the 

 timber that we bid fair to require. By such planting as 

 we can practise, no doubt we shall gain a great deal. But 

 we cannot make our home forests even an absolutely depend- 

 able resource for great emergencies. For the timber 

 maturing to its rotation age will want to be cut. We shall 

 want to get our money in. And allowing the timber to 

 stand to over-ripeness will only reduce its value. No 

 doubt during a great war we shall be able to draw upon 

 the future and fell what is not yet quite ripe. And that 

 will be a help. But in that case by eating our cake we 

 shall cease to have it. 



Notwithstanding all this, we shall have to give our atten- 

 tion to our forests, as well as to our waste lands. 



The rather pretentious proposals now put forward in 

 favour of big forest blocks of five or ten thousand acres — 



