WOODLANDS, GAME, AND SPORT 295 
before the Parliamentary Forestry Committee in 
1887. Among other witnesses the Earl of Mans- 
field’s head-forester described how hares and 
rabbits barked elm, ash, and beech trees of 80 to 
100 years of age in the Scone woods, standing 
upon their hind-legs, and leaving no bark on the 
stem up to a height of two feet above the ground. 
There is not an estate in the country where the 
productiveness of the woodlands can fail to be 
injuriously affected if preservation and increase of 
game, and particularly of ground game, is one of 
the main objects desired by the landowner. And 
there never has been an estate where a large head 
of game did not mean damage to the woods and 
coppices, particularly at the time of regeneration. 
On the whole, however, plantations are more liable 
to attack than self-sown seedlings or sowings. 
In the very earliest times, as the first two 
chapters of this volume show, the woods and the 
royal forests were mainly used for sport as well as 
for providing timber and fuel. This strong love 
of sport, and of country life and outdoor amuse- 
ments generally, has ever been hereditary, and it 
still constitutes one of the greatest attractions in 
the possession of landed estates. Nay, there can 
