GROWING GOLD. 17 



According to Hoppus,* considerably more 

 importance was attached to the timber on an 

 estate some years ago than at this period ; he 

 says, in his preface, that " he knew a steward, 

 who at his first entering into office was so 

 exact, as to take an account of every single 

 timber tree as well as others likely to become 

 timber, in all the woods within his master's 

 several manors." I have seen one of these 

 timber books, and a valuable document it was 

 to the owner, as the estate was well timbered : 

 when taken, it was a complete inventory of 

 the property. There are but few estates of 

 the nobility and gentry which do not comprise 

 from twenty to two or three hundred acres of 

 wood land or plantations. Suppose a wood of 

 thirty acres, with oak trees upon it, standing 

 only ten yards apart, of one hundred feet in 

 each tree, the price to be three shillings and 

 six pence per foot, say fifty trees per acre, 

 one thousand five hundred trees, at seventeen 

 pounds ten shillings each, equal to twenty-six 

 thousand pounds (round numbers). A calcu- 



* The author of the tables by which timber is bought and sold at this day. 

 C 



