Abstract
LAST year we gave an account of the newly-established School of Forestry at Cooper's Hill, the first of the kind in the United Kingdom, and explained what kind of instruction was there given, and how it was suited to the training of officers for the Indian Forest Department. We now propose to say something of its brother in India—an elder brother, indeed, by some eight years—the School at Dehra Doon, in the North-Western Provinces, now engaged in the education of those who may, not inaptly, be called the non-commissioned officers of the Department. The Dehra Doon is a long valley, which lies at the foot of that portion of the Himalaya which stretches between the great rivers Jumna and Ganges. It is shut off from the great Gangetic plain by a range of hills called the “Siwaliks,” known well to all students of palæonto-logical geology as the range in which were found the wonderful series of bones of extinct mammals described by Messrs. Falconer and Cautley. The valley itself lies about 2000 feet above the level of the sea, possesses a beautiful climate free from the blasts of the hot winds which, in April to June, sweep over the plains to the south of it; and is further known historically as having been the site of the first experiments made by the Indian Government in growing the tea-plant, experiments which proved its suitability to India, and made the Doon the fatherland of the great Indian tea industry—an industry which has gradually increased to such an extent that the exports of tea from India and Ceylon now very nearly rival in amount those from the Chinese Empire. Centrally situated in this beautiful valley, among plantations of tea, forests of sàl-wood, and groves where the deodar of the Himalaya may be seen alongside of the mango, typical of the Indian plains, and feathery bamboos raise their heads from an undergrowth in which wild or semi-wild roses thrive with luxuriance, lies the town of Dehra Doon, the head-quarters of a Deputy-Commissioner, of the offices of the great Trigonometrical Survey of India, of a regiment of Ghoorka troops, and of the body-guard of the Viceroy. It is rather a straggling town, like most similar Indian stations; but, centrally situated and surrounded by gardens, is found the Forest School, of which we wish to convey some idea to our readers. The School was first started, in 1878, by the exertions of the then Inspector-General of Forests, now Sir Dietrich Brandis, K.C.I.E., and the first Director was Lieut.-Colonel F. Bailey, of the Royal Engineers.
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The School of forestry at Dehra Doon, India . Nature 39, 393–394 (1889). https://doi.org/10.1038/039393a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/039393a0