>«'OTES AND QUERIES. 22t: 



I am not sure if I have quite answered your letter, but if not 

 I shall be very happy to furnish any further information in my 

 power.-Yours faithfully, M. F. Roberts. 



Railway Sleepers from Irish-grown Timber. 

 Tenders are asked for 30,000 sleepers, to be cut from Irish- 

 grown timber, for the Midland Great Western Railway of Ireland 

 They are to be of Scots, silver, spruce or larch fir, beech, or 

 Spanish chestnut, but the quality should be good, and the timber 

 dean This ,s a step in the right direction, and the conditions 

 of delivery are good, for smaller quantities than 30,000 may be 

 offered Were such a tender, especially for silver fir, Scots and 

 spruce fir, open to England or Scotland, satisfaction would be 

 great—Abridged from The Timber News and Saw-mill Engineer 

 December 3, 1904. ' 



Chiltern Hills Beech, 

 •;' No finer beech timber than that which clothes this famous hill- 

 side can be found, and for the particular trade of chairmaking it 

 cannot well be surpassed. The upper reaches are clothed with a 

 generally heavy crop of timber, the trees individually being of 

 small size; but lower down huge specimens, containing over 100 

 leet of timber, are not uncommon. 



Such is the difference between the high and lowJying woods 

 as regards size of the individual specimens, that the average price 

 per cube foot of those in the former was this season 11 id per foot 

 while special trees, growing principally at the base of the hills' 

 and containing a large quantity each of excellent timber, fetched 

 as much as 3s. per cube foot.— Abridged from The Timber News 

 4ind Saw-mill Engineer, June 25, 1904. 



Scientific Tree-butt Blasting. 

 The new system of blasting tree butts by electricity and 

 -Gehgonite" (a safety explosive) appears to be an efficient wav 

 of getting rid of these troublesome encumbrances. 



VOL. XVIII. 



