CHAP, iv S Y L V A 273 



low and moorish places, stiff and cold earth, Gf c. where 

 they never thrive. 



There is also a Virginian cypress, of an enormous 

 height, beautiful and very spreading, the branches 

 and leaves large and regular, with the clogs resembling 

 the cypress ; and though the timber be somewhat 

 course and cross-grain'd, 'tis when polish'd, very 

 agreeable ; as I can shew in a very large table, made 

 out of the planks of a spurr only ; and had experience 

 of its lastingness, tho' expos'd both to the air and 

 weather. 



14. What the uses of this timber are, for chests, 

 and other utensils, harps, and divers other musical 

 instruments (it being a very sonorous wood, and there- 

 fore employ'd for organ-pipes, as heretofore for sup- 

 porters of vines, poles, rails, and planks, (resisting the 

 worm, moth, and all putrefaction to eternity) the 

 Venetians sufficiently understood ; who did every 

 twenty year, and oftner (the Romans every thirteen) 

 make a considerable revenue of it out of Candy : And 

 certainly, a very gainful commodity it was, when the 

 fell of a cupressetum, was heretofore reputed a good 

 daughters portion, and the plantation it self call'd 

 dos filwe. But there was in Candy a vast wood of 

 these trees, belonging to the Republique, by malice, 

 or accident (or perhaps by solar heat, as were many 

 woods 74 years after, even here in England) set on 

 fire, which anno 1400, burning for seven years con- 

 tinually, before it could be quite extinguished, fed so 

 long a space by the unctuous nature of the timber, 

 of which there were to be seen at Venice planks of 

 above four foot in breadth ; and formerly the valves 

 of St. Peter's church at Rome, were fram'd of this 

 material, which lasted from the great Constantine, to 



