be almost wholly prevented by the active supervision of an intelligent woodman. Such a person will take care to divide his cuttings as nearly as he can to suit the local demand, and to begin _as early as possible_, so that every opportunity may be seized, in _suitable weather_, for getting away the produce, and it must be his own personal duty to see that no _avoidable_ injury is done to the stools by the carriages. These reasons appear to me to be quite sufficient to establish a decided preference for the mode which I recommend over the system to which I have referred; but there is another, which I cannot but think will be deemed of importance enough by itself to decide the question, and it is this: viz.: _the impossibility of deciding, before the Underwood is cut_, what Oak Trees _ought_, or _ought not_, to come down. It is quite possible, I admit, to jump to a _conclusion_ on the subject: to deny this in the face of the evidence which every succeeding Winter affords, would be absurd; but I affirm that no woodman can do it _correctly_. He ought, at least, to have a _clear coast_, to enable him to give due consideration to the various points on which he should be fully satisfied, before he cuts down that, which his whole life would not suffice to set up again. How little consideration enters into these matters, it is easy for those who really understand them to judge. For my own part, I am compelled to say, that I never yet saw a single instance, where timber was selected in the way to which I refer, without gross blunders being committed. But more than this may be affirmed—and it is not an over-weening fondness for my own plans, but a perfect conviction of the _utter want of adaptation_ in the present practice of many, which induces me to say it—there is not _one solitary argument that can be advanced in favour of the practice which I have condemned_. If this be so, then let all gentlemen abandon it; if not, let the arguments be brought forward. I have said that the whole system is wrong, and I add, that no good will be done by a patchwork attempt to amend it. So long, for instance, as a proprietor retains the “Gad-Wood” plan, he will insure the continuance of the old system of “mismanagement.” He might as well think of bending, by his own personal strength, one of the sturdy stems of his well-grown oaks, as attempt to turn his woodman gently aside out of his usual track—especially if he be an old man—there must be a total revolution effected—he must be put into an entirely new course, if either the condition of the woods, or the revenue arising from them, is to be improved.