ay 
THE COMMERCIAL CLASSIFICATION OF 
COLONY TIMBERS. 
By THE Rev. JAMEes Arken, M.A. 
The exploitation ef the colony’s timber is at present engaging more atten- 
tion than ever before. A few years ago the Government awoke to a mild 
sense of the value of this asset, and the result was still milder—the appoint- 
ment of one Forest Officer, who was attached to that Department of all 
trades yelept the Agricultural. The preparation of this officer for his important 
work was a strenuous three months at Kew. Some useful tree counts and 
the collection of identification data have been reported since his labours 
began. This is in its way good and useful and it may be that, by-and-bye, 
the Government may see the advisability of strengthening the Forestry staff 
and doing even more than they have so excellently, if inadequately, done to 
spread a knowledge of the timbers of commercial value, quite a few of which 
undoubtedly exist. Their efforts may be stimulated by the sudden appear- 
ance in the colony of a firm hailing from the States who seem for the first 
time to have brought knowledge of the market values of timber and prac- 
tical methods to bear on the export trade in colony woods. It has been 
something of a revelation to our local wood merchants and saw-millers to 
see them shipping even the great Silk Cotton tree, hitherto looked upon as a 
worthless giant of the bush, useful only to the chortling bunya and indus- 
trious ant. 
That there are other —meny other—eye-openers awaiting the circumscribed 
vision of colonials, I have very little doubt. This it is which bringsme to the 
matter of my present essay. We want 2s soon as possible an adequate investi- 
gation of the colony woods from the market point of view. We may quote 
here a brief but illumining paragraph from a timber journal which outlines 
what we mean : 
“ Recent explorations in Papua have revealed the fact that this little known 
territory abounds in valuable timbers. Altogether 79 useful woods, many 
of them new to the timber world, have been found to exist in payable quanti- 
ties along the margins of the great rivers. The Queensland expert who was 
employed estimates the amount at a million square feet to every 500 acres. 
Fifteen varieties of cabinet woods, 15 suitable for joinery, 16 suitable for 
beams, girders, etc., 10 adapted to carriage work, five for boats, four for unde;- 
water piles, and 14 muscellaneously useful woods are among the discoveries 
which are regarded by the Government of Papua as of exceptional value.” 
As will be seen this was not a scientific determination of the systematic 
place of the Papuan timbers. That is not what the Dutchmen went after. 
They wanted to know the market place of those timbers and that is the first 
thing the Government of British Guiana wants to know. In this connection 
the systematic naming of timbers is, of course, useful and intensely interesting 
