1O SCIENCE IN SOUTH AFRICA. 



School at Yale; and he has been joined by a forest apprentice from 

 Orangia. But for the obstacle presented by a foreign language, 

 the training at Nancy is that which would best satisfy the require- 

 ments of Cape students ; since, in the South of France most of the 

 trees now cultivated in the timber plantations of Cape Colony 

 are to be met with, and the climatic and fire-conserving conditions 

 resemble those in Cape Colony. In view of the fact, however, 

 that there is no English speaking forest school devoted entirely to 

 extra-tropical forestry, the expense of sending forest students 

 abroad, and the increasing demand for forest education in South 

 Africa, the project of a South African Forest School has been 

 recently revived, and has obtained the serious consideration of 

 Lord Milner and the South African Governments. 



The policy of the Cape Forest Department may be said to have 

 two chief objects : 



(1) Production at home of the timber now imported from 

 abroad. This is to be accomplished by conserving and improving 

 the indigenous forest, and by forming plantations of the most 

 valuable trees of other countries, near the railways and chief centres 

 of Colonial consumption. 



(2) The furtherance of general tree-planting in a nearly treeless 

 country, by advice and assistance to landowners and the public. 

 The principal trees planted have been sketched above. It 

 remains only to mention that the cause of tree-planting generally 

 is assisted ; by professional advice in the form of pamphlets, lectures, 

 and visits to the forest centres ; and by practical aid in the issue of 

 young trees and seeds to the public at cost price. In round numbers, 

 550,000 young trees are issued yearly to the public at an average 

 price of about fd. each, each of these trees being securely rooted 

 in a planting tray. These planting trays are formed of old paraffin 

 tins cut lengthways. During the last ten years the average value 

 of the plants and seeds sold to the public has amounted to 1,844. 

 These figures are rapidly increasing, thus during the last year in 

 the Western Conservancy the sales amounted to 3,859. 



Under Act 4 of 1876, one half the cost of all the tree-planting 

 done by Municipalities and Divisional (County) Councils (up to a 

 limit of 250 in one year) is re-imbursed by Government. The 

 administration of the tree-planting grants made under this Act, 

 rests with the Forest Department, as also the adjudication of the 

 special grants sometimes made to private tree-planters. 



THE GOVERNMENT TIMBER PLANTATIONS. 



The total expenditure on forest work since the Forest Depart- 

 ment was organised on its present basis in 1883 amounts to 778,000 ; 

 of which 293,000 has been spent on the large plantations near 

 Cape Town and on Forestry in the south-west of Cape Colony ; and 

 485,000 on plantations and Forestry elsewhere in Cape Colony. 

 The large timber plantations are situated near the chief Colonial 

 markets, and either on or close to, lines of railway. The trees 

 planted are Eucalypts, Pines, and a lesser quantity of Cedar and other 



