PRACTICAL FORESTRY. 



CHAPTER I. 

 PREFATORY REMARKS. 



IT is exceedingly difficult to avoid the too common 

 practice of generalising on the now threadbare subject 

 of agricultural distress and depression when writing 

 about any matter affecting the management and 

 improvement of landed property. To some extent, 

 undoubtedly, this failing is a necessity, as approach 

 in any direction we will the subject of improvement, 

 be it ever so far removed from agriculture, the effect 

 of the depression is manifest. The sinews of war, so 

 to speak, have so far arisen from profits and rents 

 arising from agricultural lands ; and these having 

 partially failed render it impossible to carry out 

 improvements of any kind, except by the expenditure 

 of capital drawn from the land by mortgage, or by 

 the withdrawal of capital otherwise invested. Hence 

 improvements are less general, and hence, too, arises 

 the cry for employment from nearly all agricultural 

 areas. No fault attaches, or, at least, no fault can be 



A 



