70 OUR FORESTS AND WOODLANDS 



ously be planted up have been met by some with 

 the objection that it would be vain to clothe wild 

 tracts with forest where no trees are growing. 

 This idea rests on a total misconception of past 

 historical facts. Waste lands were originally 

 under wood, and waste meant the felling or 

 cutting down of any woods which grow scatter- 

 ing, or any thick covert in the forest, without 

 the license of the Forest Court. Chalmers, in 

 his Caledonia, 1807 (vol. i. page 791), tells how 

 * every district of Caledonia, as the name implies, 

 was anciently covered with woods. The many 

 mosses of Scotland were once so many woods ; 

 as we may learn from the number of trees, which 

 are constantly dug from the forests, that have 

 lain for ages below the surface. During the 

 twelfth and thirteenth centuries not only the 

 kings, but the bishops, the barons, and abbots 

 had their forests in every district of North 

 Britain, in which they reared infinite herds of 

 cattle, horses, and swine. It will scarcely be 

 credited that many bleak moors, which now dis- 

 figure the face of the country, were formerly 

 clothed with woods, that furnished useful timber 

 and excellent pasturage; yet is the fact clearly 



