202
3
in which the
3.
and increasing importance health and prosperity of the colony may
be very deeply concerned.
2
Small as my experience of Her Majesty's Colonies has been, it has long since convinced me that there is a general tendency to under-estimate the necessity of local action on this subject in Colonies with apparently limited scope in this respect and that even something ought to be done. I have not therefore been entirely forgetful since my arrival here of the advantages of tree preservation and tree planting in Hong Kong, but I was unwilling until I could point to some actual results, to trouble the Secretary of State with any report of what I was doing.
On my arrival in Hongkong I found that Mr. Ford was on leave of absence in England and that the tree-planting had been temporarily placed under the superintendence of Mr. Price, the Surveyor General. Early in the summer of 1897 I advised Mr. Price that, on sanitary and other grounds, the operation of the so-called Forest Department should be extended. In reply to my enquiries on the subject he had informed me that the waste lands of the Colony capable of being wooded comprised about ten thousand acres: and the average number of seedling trees planted per annum was about 15,000.
In his report,