62 TIMBER SUPPLIES AND FAMINE PRICES 



nation of everything connected with forestry — what it 

 means, what it supplies, and how these supplies are 

 marketed. 



The question of the want of vessels for freight 

 purposes has been receiving considerable attention in 

 the Press and need not be entered into here. That 

 vessels are required and will have to be made avail- 

 able for the carriage of certain classes of timber to this 

 country appears now to be a matter of considerable 

 urgency. 



We can do without mahogany and other foreign 

 valuable timbers. We need not import oak or elm, 

 etc., which can be obtained from our own woods. It 

 is the coniferous timber — pines and spruces — which 

 will be required in large amounts. 



(2) Other Sources of Supply. — Are we envisaging this 

 question in the most economic fashion in depending 

 upon neutrals for our supplies ? The trade say that if 

 the demand continues on past lines we cannot obtain 

 sufficient supplies from Archangel. Since we took no 

 steps at the commencement of the war to ensure 

 supplies from other Russian ports, this is more than 

 probable. Of neutrals Sweden has taken advantage 

 of the high prices to send us timber, but she is a 

 doubtful supplier for several reasons which are well 

 known. America, and our own people in Canada and 

 Newfoundland, have greatly benefited by the great 

 rise in prices and huge quantities of timber have been 

 imported from these countries. This is satisfactory 

 for the present. We should have been hard put to it 

 without them. But it inust be rehiembered that they 

 are coining in, to a considerable extent, as the result 



