are fit for use; many of which, our readers will be surprized to hear, will be fit to cut down and applied to the purposes of the navy at 50 years old.' He admits, however, that smaller timber is now used for large ships than formerly, though he does not pretend to know the cause of it; and he also admits that a tree of one hundred years old may be a large tree, but does not undertake to say that every tree will be so even at that age. He thinks too that, when consulted in 1792, he gave an opinion that large timber in general had at that time decreased, and that since that time it has been decreasing both in the woods and hedges.* We are greatly mistaken if he has not, since that period, given a very decided opinion of the great decrease of oak timber in most parts of the kingdom, and of the very small quantity that has been planted; that people of landed property will not plant oak because it is a century in coming to its growth, and that it will not then pay them for the trouble and expense that have been incurred.

If the present committee had been able to ascertain the actual state of the country with regard to a present and future supply of oak timber, it would have rendered a most important service to the public; but as yet it has done no such thing: the evidence on the part of the ship-builders has left the question precisely where it stood; and though two thirds of the minutes of this evidence bear on this point; though it has been, as Mr. Adolphus observes 'the subject of investigation by the examination of no less than fifteen or sixteen witnesses,' the sum of the information obtained, amounts to little more than this-that there are many noblemen and gentlemen in the different counties of England and Wales who have still some oak timber growing on their estates. Nothing, indeed, could be more loose and vague than the evidence of these fifteen or sixteen timber merchants who were examined, and who are the purveyors to the Thames builders, or, as Mr. Cornelius Truffitt calls them, 'a kind of middle men.' The dealings of each of these persons, which they themselves consider to be extensive, amount on an average from a thousand to two thousand loads of oak timber in the year; and it is quite clear that their ideas of plenty and scarcity are entirely relative to the ease or difficulty with which they procured the little portions that pass through their hands, and without the least reference to the aggregate consumption of the country; of which, indeed, not a single individual ainong them appeared to have the most distant conception. They all state, it is true, that they have hitherto found no difficulty in procuring their little quota, and therefore conclude there can be no scarcity. Unable to carry their con

Minutes of Evidence, pp. 215 to 223.

ceptions so far as to suppose that one hundred thousand acres of woodland, of one hundred years growth, to be felled and replanted in rotation, are required for the demands of the navy alone, they consider a few woods of one, two, or three hundred acres within a county as evidence of abundance of timber. Ignorant that from 60 to 80,000 loads of timber are required for the annual consumption of the navy-ignorant that this quantity is but about one sixth part of the whole consumption of the country, which cannot be taken at less than 400,000 loads, they consider an estate to be rich in timber that can afford to fell 400 loads a year. Indeed when we find that every oak tree of fifty or sixty years of age, whether in clumps or in hedge rows, in parks or in fields, is known, measured, and registered in the pocketbooks of some one or other of these dealers or middle men, when not a single oak fit for felling escapes their notice, such keen observation and minute knowledge are no slight proofs of the scarcity of the article in question.

Every body has heard of the magnificent woods of Lord Ailesbury at Tottenham near Marlborough, and of course they are not forgotten in the evidence before us. The quantity fit for felling is stated by Mr. Major Bull to be from 30 to 40,000 loads, worth 600,000/.* that is to say to about one-twelfth part of a year's consumption, or barely one month's supply-but we are not told how many years must elapse before they will supply another month's consumption. It is well known that the late Lord Ailesbury, who died at a very advanced age, would never suffer a stick of timber to be cut down, though much of it was decaying, and his woods would have been improved by it; the quantity now standing is therefore the accumulated growth of two centuries. With great submission however to Major Bull, we conceive we shall be much nearer the mark in stating the quantity of timber fit for felling in Marlborough forest at 10,000 loads, including the whole of the ornamental timber in the park, and its value at 100,000l. But admitting the county of Wilts to possess one oak forest of an extent equal to what is stated by Major Bull, where shall we look for another county with such a timber estate in it? Messrs. Bowsher and Co. who are contractors for supplying the navy, enumerate in their letter to the Navy Board no less than eleven counties in which 35,000 loads are considered

• Minutes of Evidence, pp 302 and 305.

Since this was printed we have seen the evidence of Mr. Henry Fermor, timber surveyor, which we cannot possibly pass over, though we had intended not to avail ourselves of any part of the evidence in behalf of the India-built ship owners. It would seem that some of the committee entertained the same doubts as ourselves of the accuracy of Mr. Major Bull's evidence, and Mr Lavie, the solicitor, was therefore instructed to employ Mr. Fermor to make an actual survey of the several woods and wooded estates enumerated by Major Bull,

as the utmost quantity that could be procured in them in two years.*

We know not how far we may trust to the opinion of Mr. Ja cob Read of Limehouse, timber-merchant, but if that could be considered as valid, we should have a pretty good criterion to judge of the state of large naval timber in the kingdom. He says that the eight following counties with which, as a timber-merchant, he is well acquainted, namely, Hereford, Worcester, Gloucester, Warwick, Glamorgan, Brecknock, Moninouth, and Radnor, would each produce as much timber as would build a 74 gun ship, taking one county with another; and that it would require fifty years before a second crop of eight seventy-fours could be obtained from those counties; for that in procuring the first eight he must take away all the timber above forty years old, and the remaining part must stand to the age of 90 or 100 years, to afford a suffici ent quantity of large timber fit for 74-gun ships.†

As proof of the abundance of oak timber in the kingdom, it was asserted that large lots of last year's felling were still on hand, for which there was no sale; but the builders failed to shew that this superabundance had produced the usual effect of plenty, namely,

The result of the survey compared with the lumping conjectures of the land ste ward,' is too curious for us to omit.

By Major Bull, Loads 82,000By Mr.Fermor, Loads 19,065

It may be observed that if, from Major Bull's lumping way of 10 or 12, 30 or 40 thousand loads, we had taken the larger, instead of the smaller numbers, it would have made his statement to the committee about five times the quantity that is actu ally found on the estates and parishes abovementioned so much for Major Bull! Minutes of Evidence, p. 301.

> Minutes of Evidence, pp. 583 and 584.

• Minutes of Evidence, p. 384.

† Minutes of Evidence, pp. 306 and 307.

VOL. XI. NO. XXP.

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of

that of reducing the prices. Mr. Morris however, who is joint contractor with Mr. Larkins, for supplying the king's yards with timber, declares in his evidence, 'We have gone through the kingdom purchasing, and I am not accquainted with quantities lying unpurchased: I say that, in justice to ourselves, as contractors with government, there is no large timber on hand in any part the country." But Mr. John Kershaw, who has been five and twenty years in the trade, boldly asserts that 'there is, in various counties, a supply of oak timber, ready cut, for five to seven years that he has seen it-that he has himself four or five hundred loads. By a little cross-questioning, however, he admitted that he had not the least conception of the quantity required for the would general consumption of the country-that five or seven years be a most extravagant time to let timber lie after it was cut-nay, that he knew of no instance of any one merchant having got 400 loads of timber which had been cut four years. Here the learned counsel for the ship-builders objected to the line of examination, and Mr. John Kershaw was ordered to withdraw; and if, in his subsequent examination, he sometimes, like poor Wronghead in the play, said aye, when he should have said no, the agent for the ship-builders only is to blame, for having failed to prepare him for what he had to go through-a failure however which, to do him justice, he cannot often be charged with.†

Mr. Adolphus affirms boldly enough, that the contractors for supplying the dock-yards have gained the ear of government,' that this accounts for their representing timber as scarce; that they shut their eyes,' and that they cannot find their way to Limehouse to purchase timber,‡-alluding to the evidence of one Richardson, a timber-merchant of Limehouse, who, with great confidence, ridiculed the idea of any scarcity, for that he had plenty of timber, which he had offered to the contractor for the navy at 77. a load, but that he never once went to look at it. Now, what was the fact? Mr. Ramage, purveyor to the navy, examined this timber, as usual, and reported the whole of it as a parcel of trash unfit for the navy. This Mr. Richardson, who was sure that there was no scarcity of oak timber, was completely ignorant either of the supply or demand of this article.

We deemed it of some importance to determine the extent of forest that would be required to meet all the demands of the navy, on a given scale, for oak timber; the first step towards which was to ascertain the number of full grown oak trees that might be

Minutes of Evidence, p. 176.

Minutes of Evidence, p. 188, et seq.
Speech of Mr. Adolphus, p. 41.

§ Minutes of Evidence, p. 246.

expected to grow on a given quantity of land. The Commissioners of Woods and Forests calculated that 40 trees would grow on an acre of land; to keep on the safe side, we reckoned only 35, according to which, 102,600 acres, by a regular succession of felling and replanting, would afford an adequate and constant supply for all naval demands. We pointed out the danger and impolicy of placing dependence on private estates, as, from a variety of circumstances, not necessary to be here repeated, few plantations of oak had recently been, or were likely to be, planted by individuals, the principal of which was that land could be turned to more profit by any other kind of produce; and this we still maintain, notwithstanding the testimony of Mr. Major Bull, which has been particularly pointed out to Mr. Adolphus, and which he tells us, makes it quite clear that old land will not be taken out of timber in order to be made pasture, because it is not so profitable, not so wise a way of disposing of land, not so sure of producing an ultimately beneficial result, as the laying of it out to timber.**+

We stated on very good authority that oaks would not thrive on land that is not worth 20s. an acre annual rent. Mr. A. Driver says that land of 20s. an acre is too good for planting;' that 'land that is good for cultivation should not be planted, on account of the interest of money accumulating so high;' and Mr. Robert Harvey, land steward, says that in Staffordshire they never plant on land that is worth more than 14s. an acre. Now to plant oaks on such lands would be a waste of labour and of capital, for they would not reach the size of frigate timber in two centuries; yet this same Mr. Robert Harvey, whose intelligence Mr. Counsellor Adolphus is pleased to compliment, has the hardihood to avow that 'for one oak that is cut down, an hundred are planted to my knowledge; for one acre of wood that has been grubbed up, a hundred acres have been set out under my observation.' Few of our readers, we imagine, know any thing of this Mr. Robert Harvey, but most people have heard of Mr. Arthur Young, and he says that in the counties best adapted for the growth of oak not one acre has been planted for fifty acres of woodlands that have been

* Speech of Mr. Adolphus, p. 41.

Have

† Here we must again refer to Mr. Fermor's evidence.—Mr. Spankie. you known any quantities of woodland grubbed up ?—Answer. Yes; it is a general practice since corn has been so dear. I consider there have been from four to five hundred acres within five miles of Newbury'-Mr Spankie Do you know any woodland grubbed up upon the property of Lord Carnarvon —Answer. 'Yes.'Mr. Spankie. 'How much? Answer I cannot tell the quantity of aeres, but there have been two farms grubbed; a good deal laid open; the fields enlarged; the hedges have been grubbed, taking the timber and all away together'Mr. Spankie. Mr. Major Bull is the steward or manager to Lord Carnarvon ?-Anawer. Yes, he is the land steward.'-Evidence, p. 586.