April, 1909.] 



a 49 



Timbers. 



by planting, and while your home timber 

 is growing it is necessary you should 

 look up some other source of supply. 

 The two most likely regions are the 

 Amazon or the Ugauda Protectorate. 

 As the timber regions of Uganda above 

 4,000 ft. are suitable for white labour, 

 it seems to the writer that this is a much 

 more desirable region to develop than 

 the Amazon, and being within the 

 Empire would be free from the tri- 

 weekly revolutions so common in the 

 South American Republics, consequently 

 giving greater security to the capital 

 necessary to develop the forests. 



To get this timber from Uganda into 

 the British market at a reasonable price, 

 it means that experience and energy 

 must be put into it. Boys from school 

 cannot do this. Woodcraft can only be 

 learned in the woods. The very best 

 skilled lumbermen of the broad-gauge 

 type must go into this business along 

 with the investers' money if a profit 

 is to be made. I was very much amused 

 on reading an article by Mr. Winston 

 Churchill in the Strand Magazine lately 

 describing the primitive methods em- 

 ployed to supply the Uganda Railway 

 with cord wood for fuel. I quite agree 

 with him that modern methods must be 

 introduced if this Uganda timber is to 

 be used as a commercial asset of the 

 Protectorate ; logging railways must be 

 built, steam logging machines intro- 

 duced, aud modern up-to-date band-saw 

 mills constructed. Steam, electricity, or 

 compressed air are much more service- 

 able than a lazy nigger. On one point 

 I must differ from Churchill, and that 

 is about the use of the " steam tree 

 feller." In such a forest as he describes 

 it would cost more to clear a way for 

 the feller than it would do to cut the 

 timber by manual labour. To erive a 

 start to the timber business in Uganda 

 it would be necessary to man the woods 

 and mills at first with skilled white 

 labour, and by this means gradually 

 educate the young natives. The young 

 natives can be trained up to the good 

 useful woodsmen, but the old ones 

 never. At least this has been the 

 writer's experience in the Black belt 

 of the Americas. The old ones sooner 

 or later return to their banana or 

 cotton patches, but the young ones, 

 reared around the mills and woods, 

 usually stay with the plant. There is 

 a large area of timbered country that 

 is at least comparatively healthy and 

 suitable for white settlement, and 

 should be the first part to be deve- 

 loped. This region is known as the 

 Mau Escarpment, and lies between 

 Lake Naivasha and the Kasova Hills 

 on the eastern shore of the Victoria 

 Nyanza. This forest can easily be 



reached by logging railway from the 

 existing Government railway, and with 

 proper appliances and skill the timber 

 could be placed on board ship at Mom- 

 basa at about 12d. per cubic foot, 

 that is, provided the rates on the 

 Uganda railway are reasonable. Steam- 

 ers of, say, 6,000 to 8,000 tons can 

 carry it to London or other British 

 ports at 4kt per cubic foot. In all 

 the price of pitch pine is about Is. 4£d. 

 c.i.f. the Thames, but in less than 

 ten years the price of pitch pine will 

 not be less than Is. lOd. per cubic foot 

 c.i.f. British ports. Timber companies 

 going into Uganda should be very care- 

 ful to see that their; medical staff should 

 have a thorough knowledge of tropical 

 medicine as the health of the employes 

 is of prime) importance in an under- 

 taking of this kind. All camps should 

 be carefully screened to protect the 

 workers from the insect pests which 

 communicate disease, all water should 

 be boiled or artesian wells bored, a 

 small ice plant should be installed at 

 each saw mill to supply ice to the 

 village and the logging camps along 

 the companies' railway. With proper 

 precautions there is no reason why the 

 timber in river bottoms cannot also be 

 logged out. 



The writer has lived in some of the 

 worst malarial regions on the Ameri- 

 can continent for years without having 

 a single attack of malarial fever, and 

 I am convinced the same thing can be 

 done in Uganda. A proper diet of 

 well-cooked food, plenty of ice, protec- 

 tion from insects, aud as little direct 

 sunlight as possible, will enable the 

 white man to live in almost any cli- 

 mate. Do not be afraid to tackle the 

 problem of getting out the Uganda 

 timber, for it can be done. 



I estimate the timber area of Uganda 

 at 40,000 square miles, that is to say, 

 25,000,000 acres, which at 1,000 cubic feet 

 per acre would yield 25,600,000,000 cubic- 

 feet in all. Why should this enormous 

 forest be allowed to rot on the stump 

 when you need the timber so much at 

 home '? It is a self-evident fact in a forest 

 that is perpetuating itself that it de- 

 cays as fast as it grows, and we know 

 that this decay aud growth is about 

 40 cubic feet per acre per annum, 

 hence there is 1,024,000,000 cubic feet 

 rotting in the forest of Uganda every 

 year. For the benefit of the general 

 reader I may; state that this annual 

 decay of timber would, if converted 

 into sleepers, be sufficient for 170,000 

 miles of single track railway, and all 

 this without injury to the forest. 



To encourage capital to this business 

 the timber would require to be sold in 



