196 THE NEW FORESTRY. 



under forests in Germany is as twenty-six or thereabout 

 against two in Britain, reckoning density, and that German 

 forests find well-paid posts for a whole army of officers, the 

 relation of schools to forestry there will be better understood. 

 The German forester has an important and well-defined charge; 

 a good salary and position, and a number of privileges. The 

 young German forestry candidate is also encouraged to go 

 forward. After he has passed his two principal examinations — 

 the hist to test his theoretical knowledge of forestry, and the 

 second to test his ability to apply what he has learned and capa- 

 bility for employment as a forester — he is employed in some 

 probationary work, for which he receives a certain weekly or 

 daily allowance, and may look forward to a permanent post 

 within a reasonable period. The British forester has not these 

 advantages, nor anything like them, and to expect him to seek 

 a German forestry education for a situation in England 

 or Scotland is absurd. It is not worth his while. In Germany 

 it is the men who are to work in the forests that go to school, 

 and it should be the same in this country when we possess 

 schools of the right kind. If by some kind of reorganisation 

 the forester's charge in our own country could be extended so 

 as to include whole districts, better men would soon be found. 

 Colonel Pearson, of the Indian forests, in his evidence before 

 the Select Committee on Forestry, said that, " at present there 

 is no field in Great Britain in which an educated forest officer, 

 such as we find on the Continent, might gain a livelihood." 

 The Indian Forest Department is the field that attracts men 

 of the better class, and it is difficult to see, while present con- 

 ditions and uncontrolled private ownership in woods exist in 

 this country, where a better paid class of foresters could find 

 posts. Reorganisation of our woods and forests is wanted 

 first ; and the conviction has to be borne in upon the minds 

 of estate owners that planting for timber might be made re- 

 munerative before they will pay high salaries to foresters. 

 As private estates are conducted at present, the only persons 

 worth whose while it is to learn forestry on the higher scale 

 and combine it with their other duties are estate agents, and 

 at present they do not even profess, as a rule, to understand the 

 business, although the woods usually represent a large portion 

 of the value of an estate, and the most interesting portion of 

 it as well. Carelessness on the part of owners, and indifference 

 on the part of their agents, correctly describes the state of 

 affairs on most estates at present, so far as general management 

 is concerned. 



