ROOF-TREE 259 



trees before they were cut, and took a hand in saw- 

 ing them down and hauling them to the mill. One 

 bleak winter day I climbed to the top of a moun- 

 tain to survey a large butternut which some hunt- 

 ers had told me of, and which now, one year later, 

 I see about me in base and panel as I write. One 

 thus gets a lively background of interest and remi- 

 niscence in his house from the start. 



The natural color and grain of the wood give a 

 richness and simplicity to an interior that no art 

 can make up for. How the eye loves a genuine 

 thing; how it delights in the nude beauty of the 

 wood! A painted surface is a blank, meaningless 

 surface; but the texture and figure of the wood is 

 full of expression. It is the principle of construc- 

 tion again appearing in another field. How endless 

 the variety of figures that appear even in one kind 

 of wood, and, withal, how modest! The grainers 

 do not imitate oak. They cannot. Their surface 

 glares; their oak is only skin-deep; their figures 

 put nature to shame. 



Oak is the wood to start with in trimming a 

 house. How clear and strong it looks! It is the 

 master wood. When allowed to season in the log, 

 it has a richness and ripeness of tone that are deli- 

 cious. We have many kinds, as rock oak, black 

 oak, red oak, white oak, all equally beautiful in 

 their place. Eed oak is the softest, and less liable 

 to spring. By combining two different kinds, as 

 red oak and white oak (white oak takes its name 

 from the external color of the tree, and not from 



