THE NEW FORESTRY. 49 



such as could not be disposed of profitably in this country. 

 In Germany, of course, firewood has to be produced as well 

 as timber — something like thirty per cent, going for that pur- 

 pose, and the small trees and cordwood supply this demand, 

 which in Britain is unimportant. If the forests were a little 

 more evenly regulated, much of the small stuff would be got 

 rid of, and the trees left would be larger and more useful. 

 This German foresters understand, and before the end of the 

 rotation period they do sometimes thin to promote girth, but in 

 this country that would have to be the rule, while still acting 

 on the German principle of first securing height-growth, clean 

 trunks and an unbroken leaf canopy. 



It will be seen by the foregoing that in the dense system 

 of forest-tree culture, underwood, of the kind allowed for covert 

 and other purposes in the over-thinned woods of the past, is 

 not contemplated. In dense woods it cannot be grown as a 

 crop, its place being taken by timber trees. As far as game 

 covert is concerned, it will, however, be seen, by a reference 

 to Chapter II., that an equivalent for underwood is provided 

 in the shape of open glades or spaces filled with trees and 

 bushes of the usual underwood kind, and where they are sure 

 to thrive far more successfully than under trees. Underwood 

 in dense woods is, however, not an impossibility if the right 

 species are selected, and the subject is dealt with in a short 

 chapter towards the end of the book. 



SECTION III. — TIMBER-TREES OF THE OLDER BRITISH 

 WOODS. 



It must not be supposed from what has been said that the 

 timber produced in Britain has always been of the description 

 produced by the cultural methods of Brown and his prede- 

 cessors. There are good reasons for supposing that before 

 the empirical system of forestry in vogue during the present 

 century began, our forests were, to a large extent, of natural 

 growth, and that much of the best timber which was supplied 

 for the navy and other purposes came from such forests. 

 A reference to the navy estimates in " Haydn's Dictionary of 

 Dates," from the beginning of the eighteenth to well on in the 

 present century, will show that the demand for timber for ships 

 must have gone up by leaps and bounds, and during that 

 period the woods of England must have been ransacked for 

 timber of large size. That this was the case is proved also by 

 4 



