Thirty years ago the price of underwood as it stood growing, at twelve years old, was about twenty pounds an acre; but to-day five pounds an acre is considered a good price for first-class underwood, so hard has the industry been hit by substitutes for ash and hazel. Though we have known underwood to fetch only half a crown an acre, we have seldom seen it described by auctioneers as other than "prime and ripe." The most useful kind is hazel. All sorts of sticks and stakes for the garden are cut of hazel. Wattle-fences are made of it, neatly woven, and the "hethers" which bind the tops of live fences. Closely woven hazel hurdles form a splendid protection for sheep from wind and rain; they cost, to buy, about eight shillings a dozen, and the hurdler is paid about half that sum. Hazel is now largely used in making the crates in which the product of the Potteries is packed. The cleanest growths were formerly made into the hoops of barrels, and one might see thousands of bundles stacked in a clearing. But iron is killing the hoop-makers' industry. One use of hazel has been unaffected by time--the use to which the country blacksmith puts it, when he winds handles of the shoots for his chisels and wedges--being pliant, they allow his tools to adjust themselves to the blow of the hammer. And the hazel-wand remains the favourite divining-rod of the water-finders. * * * * * The Tipping System Gamekeepers are much associated with tipping. If tips are to be reckoned as part wages, the element of chance is great and unfair. There are cases when tipping amounts to bribery, as when a rich man buys the best place in a shoot. For the system, it may be said that a tip is the most convenient token of appreciation of skill in producing good sport. And we agree that if any servant of pleasure deserves a tip it is the gamekeeper. But among the fallacies of the system is the fact that the scale of tips is seldom in proportion to skill and energy. Thus, a tip of a certain amount is given for a day's covert shooting of, say, under a hundred head, half pheasants, calling for a certain amount of energy and skill on the keeper's part. But a tip of only half the amount will be given after a thirty-brace day at driven partridges, which has afforded five times the amount of shooting, and called for ten times more skill and energy from the keeper. There is a saying among keepers that tips may be looked upon to provide three useful things--beer, 'baccy, and boots. In old times a five-pound note was the order of the day--this is represented now by half a sovereign or five shillings. A few keepers are lucky enough to serve where wealthy sportsmen shoot regularly, who willingly give the keeper a ten-pound note. But most keepers praise heaven for £10 received in tips in a season. Where the scale of tips most fails is when a tip covers compensation for injuries. But the beater who