12 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



and minor musical instruments are scattered 

 about among the luxurious rugs and furnish- 

 ings. On the walls of this great room are 

 many beautiful paintings, a considerable part 

 ted by Mr. Mershon. Here 

 he realizes his fullest enjoyment, and here it 

 is that he dabbles with brush and colors, plays 

 his gnat organ, and reads his books — and 

 perchance thinks out new ideas for the im- 

 Micnt of band resawing machinery. 

 The grains of the resaw is rather a solitary 

 man. His intimates an- few, and commer- 



cially he lias devoted a large portion of his 

 life to one idea — the production of a tool of 

 the highest efficiency, that should do its work 

 with minimum waste. In this effort he has 

 been successful, and his history recalls the 

 lines of < Iwen Meredith, 



"The man who seeks one thing in life, and but 



one. 

 May hope to achieve ii before life be done: 

 But he who seeks all things, wherever he goes, 

 i inly reaps from the hopes which around him he 



sows 

 A harvest of barren regrets." 



Wonderful Growth of a Hardtoood 



Tree. 



A f Grand Rapids, Mich., in .line'. 1894, a 

 girl and a t inj t ree irere born. 



The seedling consisted of two puny leaves 

 attached to a trail stalk that had thrust 

 venturesome way up between the crevices of 

 a half rotten board -id. 'walk. 



Grandmother, who loves every animate thing 

 on tin- face ot tiir earth, rescued tin' little 

 plant from its precarious place of birth, and 

 carefully plant''! it in her flower garden. It 



l.l EVEN •> BAR i ii. n WATER ELM, 



rewarded her attention by thriving, and soon 

 discovered that her waif was a water-elm 



in embryo. Sh '. transplanted it in 



her door-yard and since thai time the tree has 

 flourished, until today it stands with perfect 

 trunk, twenty nine and a half inches in i -ir 



cumference, and beautiful spreading branches 



II i:\ EN u:.\l( OLD WATER 

 TOP. 



ELM SHOWING 



thai reach toward the sky a distance of more 

 than forty feet. 



The baby granddaughter is n..w a tall, 

 rosj faced miss of eleven years. The tree and 

 the maiden are herewith pictured. The photo- 

 graph was made a couple of weeks ago, by the 

 editor of the Hardwood Record, to illustrate 

 the wonderful possibilities of tree growth 

 under anything like favorable conditions. 



The water-elm's natural habitat is wet, 

 heavy soil, and it thrives best in closely en- 

 compassed woods growth. This seedling was 

 planted iii a gravel soil, containing consider- 

 able natural moisture, but not one particularly 

 suitable for water elm growth. However, the 

 tree found its permanent home between the 

 shelter of two houses, which stand not more 

 than t«. utv two feel apart, and thus the body 

 of the tree has been protected quite largely 

 from the cold blasts of winter and much of 

 the time from the heat of summer suns. 



To be sure, the water-elm is a comparatively 

 last growing hardwood, but consider the 



growth of a tree of such unnatural birth as 

 this one, that has added an annual average 

 of Dearly an inch to its girth during the first 

 eleven years of its history. Some cranks still 

 tell us that timber growing is chimerical, but 

 such is not the case. Tree growing is a 

 commercial proposition that promises great 

 revenue even within the lifetime of the mid- 

 dle-aged man who engages in it. A timber 

 crop is one that requires but one thing — being 

 left alone. Exclude stock and trespassers; 

 avoid cultivation; protect from fire; and 

 Dame Nature unaided will recreate a forest 

 on almost any land. 



A Pest of Bugs. 



Several reports come from Wisconsin to the 

 effect that bugs are attacking the maples of 

 that state to an extent that it is feared that 

 Hie entire maple growth will be killed. Trees 

 .in attacked by bogs which gather in countless 

 numbers "ii the tree, working their way through 

 crevices of the outer bark into the new or live 

 lark ami drawing tile sap from the tree, which 



a i destroys its life. The old or matured 



bug is about one-eighth of an inch In length, 

 ha- six legs, is dark colored and has a flat 

 body. It starts at the body, crawling close to 

 the tree in the crevices of the bark and fastens 

 cocoons in these crevices. These cocoons con- 

 t.iin hundreds "f eggs, which soon hatch out 

 and the result is that millions of young bugs 

 me produced, Which WOrS their way Up tile tree 



to the younger branches and begin the work of 

 ictlon. It does not matter what size the 

 tree ma; he, mine is immune from the attack 

 ni this parasite, 



I'm- a remedy the state experimental stnti.m 

 recommends that if the tree Is but slightly at- 

 tacked the bugs call he killed by an application 

 ol whale nil. sprayed carefully in crevices. If 

 - nut tun high an ordinary window 

 i' can be used for this purpose. The whale 

 ell is nothing mure than ordinary machine oil 

 sold at any paint store and is inexpensive. 

 ii ; i. cheap "ii will answer the purpose. 



another remedy is a spray of an emulsion of 

 kerosene nil and water, mixed in the proportions 

 nf ime half pint of kerosene to one gallon of 

 water As water and kerosene will not mix, 

 soap should first be put in the water and stirred 

 until a suds is obtained, when the water and 

 nil will emulsify. This should be applied to 

 tin- tree with a strong spray pump and if the 

 work is carefully dime i he scale can easily be 

 killed. 



As a preventive measure tin- bureau says that 

 on trees not already attacked a preventive 

 measure may be employed by soaking a piece 

 of burlap or heavy cloth of any kind In kerosene 

 nil and tying the same around the tree near the 

 ground. This will prevent the adult bug from 

 crawling up the tree and depositing the eggs. 



Aging Oak with Ammonia. 



Previous reference has been made in the IIaru- 

 wi.nii Itt:i nun to ammonia processes of aciim 

 oak. The manual training magazine says that 

 strong ammonia fumes may be used for aging 

 oak. Place the piece to be fumed, with an 

 evaporating dish containing concentrated am- 

 monia. In a box and close it air tight. Leave 

 for 12 hours and finish with a wax polish, ap- 

 plying first a yellow and white beeswax heated 

 over a thin coat of paraffin nil and then rub- 

 bing with a pomade prepared as follows: to two 

 ounces of prepared wax melte.i over a slow tire 

 In an agate-ware vessel, add four ounces tur- 

 pentine, and stir till entirely cool. Keep the 

 turpentine away from tbe fire. This will give 

 the oak a lustrous brown color and nicking will 

 not expose a different surface, as the ammonia 

 fumes penetrate to a considerable depth. 



