This was a small booklet of 34 pages, a mere pamphlet in size, published in 1613 by Arthur Standish and entitled _New Directions of Experience ...

for the Increasing of Timber and Firewood_.

In this, Standish strongly urged sowing and planting on an extensive scale; and the pamphlet was so highly approved by King James I., that in 1615 a second edition was issued.

This included, among the prefatory matters, a royal proclamation 'By the King, To all Noblemen, Gentlemen, and other our loving Subjects, to whom it may appertaine,' which set forth the 'severall good projects for the increasing of Woods' and recommended them to 'be willingly received and put in practise' with a view to restore the decay of timber 'universally complained of' within the realm.
Although exhortations and royal proclamations had previously been issued more than once by James I.relative to the 'storing' of timber trees when falls were being made in copsewoods, and generally to ensure better effect being given to the intentions of Henry VIII's _Statute of Woods_ of 1543, as amended during Queen Elizabeth's reign (in 1570), yet Standish's treatise was the first occasion (so far as I have been able to discover) on which a private subject had endeavoured to stimulate the progress of British Forestry by means of the publication of his views in the form of a small book.

His aims and objects are thus described on the title-page of the second or royal edition of 1615:--"NEW DIRECTIONS OF EXPERIENCE AUTHORIZED BY THE King's most excellent Majesty, as may appeare, for the increasing of Timber and Fire-wood, with the least waste and losse of ground.