ETO 583 EDITOR 07 ran "Srsornros,"]
Sta,—In your issue of January 3rd my friend Sir John Stirling Maxwell challenges your criticism of the policy of the Government in regard to afforestation. I hope he will forgive me if 1 say that his letter is a singular instance of the flimsy argument that advocates of afforestation usually employ. He tells us that the area of forest in the German Empire exceeds thirty-four million acres, and that this brings in a very large income. Undoubtedly, but what then P What should we think of a prospectus in any other industrial undertaking which, omitting all reference to the amount of capital invested, and the length of time that capital has remained unremuuerative, merely assured us that it brought the shareholders in a very large income P " It need scarcely be pointed out" (to use Sir John's own phrase) that the assertion proves nothing. Again, he asks us to believe that the world's supply of timber is not keeping pace with the demand, and supports this view by pointing out that the price of all kinds of timber is rising rapidly. If he had said that the rise in the price of timber is a proof that the available supply is diminishing he would have been right, and it will rise until it becomes worth people's while to open up com- munication with the vast virgin forests of Africa, the Malay Archipelago, and other parts of the world, and then the price will fall again, to the discomfiture of the descendants of the existing race of arbmiculturists in Great Britain. It is perhaps hardly worth while to notice his last plea for afforesta- tion—viz., that it employs labour—because the advantage of doing so depends upon the considerations above mentioned. If the employment of labour can be carried on at remunera- tive rates, it is an unmixed good. If it is conducted at a loss, it is merely Socialism in disguise. There is no investment which has been more advertised than afforestation. If there
is any money in it, why have no companies been formed to work it P If half we are told were well founded, capitalists would be tumbling over one another to obtain land upon which to carry out their operations.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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