460 A HANDBOOK OF CONIFERS 



well, takes glue excellently and can be painted or polished with ease. 

 When used indoors it has excellent lasting qualities, but when ex- 

 posed to weather changes, or when used in contact with the soil, it 

 should be creosoted or treated with some other antiseptic. The uses 

 of Scots pine wood are innumerable and it is the commonest wood 

 in everyday use not only in the British Isles but in N. Europe. 

 It is employed very extensively in house-building, from beams 

 and rafters to window-frames, flooring boards, doors, cupboards 

 and furniture ; for heavy constructive work, fencing, boat and 

 shipbuilding, masts and telegraph poles, scaffold poles and pit 

 props and very extensively, when creosoted, for railway sleepers 

 and street paving blocks. The best grades of wood, laid on a 

 good concrete foundation, withstand very heavy wear, and on 

 Westminster Bridge, London, where heavy traffic is fast and 

 continuous, the same blocks remained in use for over 13 years. 

 Wood used for fencing and farm buildings should be creosoted, 

 particularly those parts that are in contact wdth the soil, also the 

 lower parts of scaffold poles that may be buried, and floor joists 

 or other timber that may be built into walls. As is the case with 

 other soft woods, Scots pine is very susceptible to attack by 

 " dry rot fungus " {Merulius lacrymans). Wherever there is a free 

 circulation of air the fungus does not thrive, but in a stagnant 

 atmosphere it develops with great rapidity unless the timber has 

 been treated with a suitable antiseptic. After the timber has 

 been worked to the necessary size, hot or cold creosote should be 

 injected. Full particulars of the processes are given by WaUis- 

 Tayler.i 



Prejudice has often been at the bottom of the whole-hearted 

 condemnation of home-grown timber, and during the late war 

 many users were greatly surprised to flnd that Scots pine wood 

 equal in quality to the best imported from Scandinavia was 

 available in Britain, and especially in the forests of Scotland, 

 although similar timber had for years been practically unsaleable 

 at a remunerative price. Scandinavian merchants, by placing 

 their timber upon the British market in an attractive manner, 

 carefully graded and worked to standard sizes, saved the British 

 agent and user considerable trouble ; hence, to a great extent, the 

 displacement of home-grown wood which was usually offered 

 ungraded and in the round. In pre-war days the cost of import 

 was often less than the railway freight of home-grown wood, and 

 thus a combination of circumstances led to the disparagement of 

 our timber, users gradually persuading themselves that their 

 almost total dependence upon foreign-grown wood was due 

 solely to the superior quality of the imported article. That 

 home-grown Scots pine possesses all the necessary qualities for 

 substantial buildings is emphasized by an examination of the 



1 The Preservation of Wood (1918). 



