PIN 



OR, BOTANICAL DICTIONARY. 



PIN 



329 



for making the wheels of post-chaises and other carriages, 

 as being very durable, and unapt to crack. No boards make 

 better wainscoting, or take paint better. The application 

 of it to shingles for covering barns or other out-houses would 

 be a great improvement, as it would look better than thatch; 

 would be impenetrable by wind or rain ; and not burning 

 readily, must be still more desirable, because the straw 

 thatch is liable to all these accidents, and harbours vermin 

 and all sorts of filth, to the great annoyance of the grain- 

 houses in buildings so covered. In short, thatch, though 

 cheaper at. first, is dearer in the long-run than tiling or 

 slating. The shingles used in the Orisons are half an inch 

 thick and a foot square; being of a tough nature, and nailed 

 down to the rafters, they are not liable to the inconvenience 

 of being broken by forks, like tiles and slates. The thinnings 

 of Larch plantations may be applied to a variety of useful 

 purposes, while they are of a small size. In six, eight, or 

 ten years, according to circumstances, the trees will have 

 attained a size sufficient to be made into hayrakes. They 

 grow so straight, and the wood is so light, strong, and dura- 

 ble, as to be peculiarly calculated for this purpose; and 

 these rakes will remain firmer, and shrink less, than those 

 made from any other wood. About two feet cut off from 

 the root-end will form the rake head ; and five feet above 

 that, with a very little taken off from the thickness of the 

 under part, will form the handle. No wood is more proper 

 for the teeth of the rake, than the red wood of a full-grown 

 Larch, because it is not only tough, but little liable either to 

 split or shrink. Nothing is so fit for shafts to hoes; for it is 

 nearly as strong, and much more durable, than ash. Handles 

 for brushes, brooms, scythes, &c. would occasion a vast con- 

 sumption of the small spars. Light, neat, and strong chairs, 

 for rush bottoms, might be made of Larch wood at this age. 

 Nothing will better answer for hop-poles, one set of which 

 would outlast two or three sets of Ash. Hurdles, spars, and 

 gates, may be made of it, both lighter and more durable 

 than any other wood ; and when the trees are sufficiently 

 large, they may be split down for cart-shafts ; and in mining 

 countries they might be employed as posts for supporting 

 the roofs of the mines. The small tops cut off in making 

 these various works, would furnish a neat, elegant, cheap, 

 and durable kind of railing, to be put upon the top of low 

 walls, especially for preventing light sheep from over-leaping 

 them. One end might be let into the coping, whether of 

 sod, clay, or lime ; and the other end received into a slip 

 of sawn Larchwood, with holes bored through to receive their 

 points. From the straightness of the wood, this kind of 

 rail would be very neat, without much expense. In the 

 same manner, hen-coops, crates for packing earthenware, 

 glass, &c. might be made of those materials. But one of 

 the most extensive and beneficial uses of this kind of small 

 wood, is for the purpose of enclosing. These spars, when 

 the root is thick enough, may be slit up the middle by a 

 saw, and cut into lengths of five or six feet; or if smaller, 

 they may be employed whole. As they are always straight, 

 and nearly of a uniform thickness, if driven into the ground 

 for a few inches, in a row at the distance of a few inches 

 from each other, with the split sides all one way, they would 

 make one of the neatest and most complete fences that can 

 be seen. The tops of these uprights may be received into 

 a piece of sawn plank, with holes bored in it for that pur- 

 pose ; and supported at due distances by sloping pieces 

 reaching from the ground to the top. These are a few of 

 the uses to which the small spires from the first "thinnings 

 of the plantations may be applied. As they advance to a 

 larger size, for windows, joists, flooring, parcelling, couples, 



rafters, and every other purpose in building, they would be 

 superior to any kind of wood hitherto employed for these 

 purposes; and for ship-building, especially planks, it would 

 even be superior to Oak itself. There is not a branch or 

 twig of this tree that may not be put to some useful purpose. 

 The larger branches may be employed in fencing, and the 

 smaller for filling drains, and for fuel. In drains it is more 

 durable than any other wood ; and though the timber will 

 not readily burn, yet the brush is found to make a fire almost 

 equal to the billets of many other trees. A most valuable 

 produce of the Larch-tree is the Venice turpentine ; which 

 issues spontaneously from the bark ; but is more commonly 

 obtained by boring a hole with an auger, about two feet 

 above the ground, till it reaches nearly to the heart of the 

 tree ; into this hole is inserted a small pipe or cock, through 

 which the turpentine flows into proper vessels placed for its 

 reception. This process is continued from the end of May 

 till the end of September. When the trees will yield no 

 more for that season, the turpentine is pressed through a 

 cloth to purify it. That so obtained is usually thinner thait 

 any of the other sorts, of a clear whitish or pale yellowish, 

 colour, a hot, pungent, bitterish, disagreeable taste, and a 

 strong smell, without any thing of the aromatic flavour of 

 the Chian or Cyprus turpentine, obtained from Pistacia 

 Terebinthus. The common and Strasburgh turpentine is 

 from the Pinus Picea ; and the Canada Balsam, which may 

 be considered as the purest of the turpentines, is procured 

 from the Silver and Balm of Gilead Firs. The turpentine 

 of the Larch resides in the bark and wood next to it, as 

 appears when the trunk is sawn transversely; for then it may 

 be seen that the inner wood for more than half the diameter 

 is dry. The turpentine is not to be obtained in considerable 

 quantities from very young trees, and in old ones it gradu- 

 ally dries up, till at last it affords none : it is only after the 

 tree has attained the thickness of ten or twelve inches in, 

 diameter, that it is thought worth while to collect the tur- 

 pentine ; and from that time, during forty or fifty years, if it 

 continues so long in vigorous growth, the tree will continue 

 to yield annually from seven to eight pounds of turpentine. 

 All the turpentines dissolve totally in rectified spirit ; they 

 become miscible with water into a milky liquor, by the medi- 

 ation of the yolk or the white of an egg, and more elegantly by 

 mucilages. Distilled with water, they yield a subtile pene- 

 trating essential oil, vulgarly called Spirit; a yellow or black- 

 ish resin remaining in the still, which forms the common 

 rosin of the shops. The essential oil, on being distilled in 

 a retort, becomes more subtile, and in this state is called 

 Ethereal Oil of Turpentine. The turpentines stimulate the 

 first passages, and prove laxative ; and we are told by Dr. 

 Cullen, that half an ounce or an ounce of Venice turpentine 

 triturated with the yolk of an egg, and diffused in water, 

 may be employed in the form of an injection, as the most 

 certain laxative in colics, and other cases of obstinate cos- 

 tiveness. When turpentine is carried into the blood-vessels 

 it stimulates the whole system, hence its usefulness in chronic 

 rheumatism and paralysis. It read'ily passes off by urine, 

 which it imbues with a peculiar odour; also by perspiration, 

 and probably by exhalation from the lungs : and to these 

 respective effects are to be ascribed the virtues it may possess 

 in gravelly complaints, scurvy, and pulmonic disorders. In 

 all these diseases, however, and especially the last, this medi- 

 cine, as well as some of the gums and balsams of the terebin- 

 thinate kind, by acting as stimulants, are often productive of 

 mischief. Turpentine has been much used in gleets and fluor 

 albus ; and its efficacy in the latter is ascribed to its indu- 

 cing some degree of inflammation in the urethra. The essen- 



