USES OP WOOD. 201 



The detaching of the cork in half-cylinders in 

 the manner previously indicated as the method 

 adopted for obtaining Birch bark for canoes 

 does not, curiously enough, injure the tree if care 

 be taken in the process not to cut the inner bark, 

 which in time -after the lapse of some eight or 

 ten years itself becomes cork, and is replaced in 

 turn by another inner bark. 



Fragrance is one special characteristic of 'the 

 wood of the Common or Evergreen Cypress 

 (Cupressus semper virens). It is also hard, very 

 close and fine in its grain, and extremely durable. 

 It has, moreover, the advantage of colour, for it is 

 tinged with red. Besides its hardness and great 

 durability, it also is elastic, and thus is superior 

 to many kinds of woods for building, both for the 

 structural parts and for doors, stairs, and indeed 

 for any purpose in which hardness, elasticity, and 

 durability are requisite. In the time of Con- 

 stantine it is stated that the doors of St. Peter's 

 Church at Rome were made of Cypress wood, and 

 when, eleven hundred years afterwards, Pope 

 Eugenius IV. took them down, in order to erect 

 brass ones in their places, there was no evident 



