92 TIMBEE 



for sleepers. The State of Washington supplies 69 per cent, 

 of the total cut in the United States with the exception of 

 the red or pencil cedar. They are but little known in the 

 English timber trade. 



These cedars must not be confounded with the furniture 

 cedar of the English market which is the produce of the 

 Cedrda odorata and is of the same species as mahogany. 



Red Gum (Liquidambar styraciflua), sometimes called sweet 

 gum, is the timber known in the English market as satin 

 walnut one of the many misnomers of the trade. 



It is the most common of the three species of gum which 

 grow in the southern States (from Carolina to Kansas 

 and south to the Gulf of Mexico) and is the commonest 

 tree in parts of the south. In the best situations it attains 

 a height of 150 ft., with 5 ft. diameter, but this is excep- 

 tional ; the stem is straight and cylindrical, and the timber 

 is exported from the southern ports in logs up to 18 ft. 

 long and 24 inches a side. Much of it grows along swampy 

 land subject to flooding, and great difficulty arises in cut- 

 ting and getting it to market, the green timber being so 

 heavy that much of it will not float. About 60 per cent, of 

 the timber, and in some cases as much as 85 per cent, of 

 trees 15 inches in diameter, is sap, whilst in the larger trees 

 the percentage is less. The sap is a creamy white colour, 

 the heartwood rich reddish brown ; the timber is straight 

 in grain and has but few knots, the heartwood is very 

 durable, the sap quickly decays ; it is not strong enough for 

 structural work. The external appearance of the wood is of 

 fine grain and smooth, close texture, but when broken the 

 lines of fracture do not run with the apparent direction of 

 the growth ; possibly it is this unevenness of grain which 

 renders the wood so difficult to dry without twisting. It is 

 a fairly tough wood, about as strong and stiff as chestnut, 



