But as soon as the first half-civilized men began to keep cattle, sheep, and especially goats, more serious inroads still were made upon the forest. Where such animals are allowed to graze there is no chance for wood to grow (at any rate in a temperate country). The growing trees and the branches of older ones are nibbled away whilst they are young and tender. The days of the forest were nearly over when cultivation commenced. Dr. Henry describes the process of "nomadic" culture in China as follows: "They burn down areas of the forest; gather one or two crops of millet or upland rice from the rich forest soil; and then pass on to another district where they repeat the destruction."[18] A very similar process of agriculture existed until the eighteenth century in Scotland.
Shooting the Hozu Rapids in Japan
The logs in the long train of rafts are of bamboo tied together. In spite of their fragile nature the lumbermen are so fearless and agile that they cleverly steer the frail bundles with but few accidents.
Thus the forest was being burnt or cleared for cultivation. It was devastated by black cattle, goats, and other animals, and it was regularly exploited for fuel and building every day by every family for centuries.
It is not, therefore, surprising that the ancient forests in Britain have disappeared. Dr. Henry mentions one square mile of virgin forest on the Clonbrock estate in Ireland. The Silva Caledonica of the Romans is said to exist in Scotland at the Blackwood of Rothiemurchus, at Achnacarry, and in a few other places. Of the original oak forest, which covered most of England and Southern Scotland, not a vestige (so far as is known to the writer) remains to-day.
There are in places very ancient forests. A few miles from Retford are considerable remains of Sherwood Forest, which is for ever associated with that genial bandit Robin Hood. One huge oak (called the Major) has or used to have a keeper always on guard and paid by Lord Manvers, but there are hundreds of aged oaks all round it. Then there is the Knightwood Oak and some other ancients in the New Forest.
But it is not certain that these even date so far back as the time of Canute, for so far as the New Forest is concerned, it seems that this was formed either by Canute or by William I. The Saxons seem to have destroyed most of the English forests.
In Scotland oak forest existed as far north as the Island of Lewis, in Caithness, Dornoch, Cromarty, and along Loch Ness, as well as in every county south of these.[19] The deer forests and grouse moors, now desolate, whaup-haunted muir-land and peat mosses, were flourishing woods of magnificent Scots fir at no very distant period. They ascended the hills on the Cairngorms to 1400 or 1500 feet, and in Yorkshire to 2400 feet.[20]