326 OUR FORESTS AND WOODLANDS 
ing the different woods into blocks, by consider- 
ing and fixing the best periods of rotation, and 
by judicious allocation of the annual thinnings 
and falls of timber and of coppice, the Scheme. 
of Management will strive to realise, as fully 
as is practicable, the desire of the landowner, 
and to obtain for him the largest returns which 
the land can be made to yield in the shape of 
a regular yield sustained year after year. Even 
details have to be fully considered, as, for ex- 
ample, providing edge-shelter or wind-mantles of 
thickly-foliaged evergreen trees along all the sides 
of woods exposed to the deteriorating influence 
of heavy winds. In various other minor matters 
there is also room for improvement. Thus, 
timber is often sold standing, and the buyer 
carries out the felling. Even if the latter employ 
the woodmen on the estate to do this, as is often 
the case, the work is not likely to be so carefully 
performed, or the damage to underwood or young 
growth minimised so effectively, as if the opera- 
tion were conducted directly for the proprietor, 
and by his own men working under the personal 
supervision of the wood-reeve. This seems to be 
an old method surviving from ages ago. Even 
