232 AMERICAN LUMBER IN FOREIGN MARKETS. 



three-sixths, with which the latter party is able to make himself quite 

 comfortable. 



That the importer, the dealer, the freighter, and the Government 

 here are doing well on a business of this kind, goes without saying, but 

 our manufacturer at home, having commenced business as a young man 

 on a piece of timber land, and having worked hard all his life, finds 

 himself when he has grown old, poor and without any resources, as the 

 land from which the timber has disappeared without benefit to him is 

 valueless without it. 



What steps should be taken to remedy these hardships falling upon 

 the producer in this branch of industry, are for him to decide; but it 

 would seem that a direct connection between the manufacturer and the 

 actual dealer were preferable to the way this business has been done 

 so far; or, still better, if the parties interested in the lumber-milling 

 business would join together and establish rules of their own in order 

 to protect themselves, and at the same time guard against the useless 

 destruction of the timber wealth of our country without compensating 

 benefit. 



EDGAR SCHBAMM, Consul 



MONTEVIDEO, April 30, 1896. 



ASPEN WOOD FOR MATCHES. 



The manufacture of matches in Germany, which has risen to be an 

 industry of importance, employs pine, poplar, aspen, linden, and birch 

 woods. Of these woods, aspen has proved itself indispensable in the 

 manufacture of matches by reason of its natural qualities and the ease 

 with which it can be worked up. It is distinguished by its large struc- 

 ture, ready combustibility, freedom from knots, and uniformity of sub- 

 stance. 



The flame of a match, as is well known, is conveyed to the wood from 

 the igniting composition by sulphur, as in the case of lucifers, into which 

 the splints are dipped. In the case of Swedish matches the sulphur is 

 substituted by paraffin. The sulphur, where this is used, remains on 

 the outside of the wood and dries at once. The paraffin, however, 

 must penetrate into the wood, partly because the matches would other- 

 wise stick to each other, but principally because the paraffin becomes 

 fluid again at even low degrees of heat and would penetrate the ignit- 

 ing composition and render it useless. For safety matches, therefore, 

 a wood is required which has light and spongy pores, as found only in 

 the aspen, whose bright white color further gives it an agreeable appear- 

 ance. Poplar has a gray color and is brittle ; birch wood becomes yellow 

 and is seldom obtainable in stout logs. These woods are also slow of 

 combustion. Pine and fir woods take up little paraffin, owing to the 

 resin they contain. 





