operate in the scheme of afforestation.” 
But as we have seen in the case of Ger- 
many, there is a great deal to be gain- 
ed by working afforestation on a com- 
prehensive and systematic plan that 
shall be perfectly consistent and con- 
tinuous over a long period of time; and 
it is clearly impossible to secure 
these advantages in the highest attain- 
able degree, unless the work is taken 
up by the State. So far as corporations 
are concerned, the commercial bodies 
best fitted to undertake afforestation 
are railway companies. “Railroads,” 
says Mr. J. Gifford, of Cornell Univer- 
sity, in an article on “The Railroads 
and Forestry,” “as a matter of fact 
ean, produce timber to better advantage 
than any other proprietor”; and the 
reasons he gives are that railroad .com- 
‘panies are long-lived, they must have 
timber for ties, and sleepers, and 
bridges, and they can transport it at 
a minimum cost. The reduction of the 
future ‘cost of maintenance is to such 
corporations, as Mr. Gifford says, sim- 
ply .a business proposition, and he 
quotes a large amount of evidence to 
show that in America they have made 
a great success of it. In a country like 
cur own, where the railroads are in 
the hands of the State, the arguments 
in favour of afforestation by corporate 
enterprise apply with equal force to the 
assumption of this public duty by Gov- 
ernment itself. As to action by pri- 
vate individuals, a great deal has, of 
course, been done by rich land owners 
in England and America to repair the 
ravages in the native forests, and to re- 
stock their estates with timber. 
in New Zealand, young and relatively 
poor as the country is, reforestation 
and afforestation have been carried out 
more or less tentatively and experi- 
mentally by a large number of our set- 
ters and station holders. The work 
done in this respect by Mr. J. Hall, at 
Parawai. (chiefly experiments on the 
growth of indigenous trees), by Mr. 
kh. Reynolds, at Cambridge, and by Mr. 
I Adams at Greendale, Canterbury, de- 
serves public recognition, not to say 
28 
Even | 
-ceipts from the State Forests. 
public gratitude. Those of my reaq. 
ers who have had occasion to refey to 
cur Government publications bearing 
on the land, and its products must pe 
familiar with the reports of Mr. Adams 
upon the growth of imported trees 
which form a permanent feature of ike 
Official Year Book of the Dominion. 
But such experimtntal work, valuable 
as it undoubtedly has proved itself to 
be, lacks the essential requisites 
of comprehensiveness and _ continy- 
ity; and apart from all other eop- 
siderations, the heavy expense and 
the long period of waiting involved, 
render-it impossible that any systematic 
scheme of afforestation or reforestation 
could be undertaken in New Zealand 
by private enterprire alone. In this 
country, where we ‘have extended the 
functions of Government with such 
teneficial results to so many forms of 
public work and duty, we may fairly 
throw the chief responsibility for the 
replanting of our forests and the re 
plenishing of our timber supply upon 
the State. 
WHAT NEW ZEALAND HAS DONE. 
I may say here that I do not suppose 
that many people whose attention has 
not been specially called to the facts 
of the case, have any idea of the 
amount of work already done in this 
direction in New Zealand by our vari 
ous Governments. As Mr. Kensington, 
the Under-Secretary for Lands, pointed 
cut recently in his evidence before the 
Timber Commission, reforestation, as 
the work of a State department, has 
been in existence in this country only 
about ten years. During this period, 
the whole of the outlay—some £170,000 
ir. all—has been drawn from the re 
Not 4 
single penny has yet been voted by 
Government for the special purpose of 
reforestation. But, in spite of the im 
adequate financial basis on which out 
Forestry Department is founded, 
much valuable work has been done. 
About 63,500,000 trees and_ seedlings 
have been planted, of which over 6,000;- 
