SUNDRY USES OF SPLIT WOOD. 147 



commonly split along the annual rings, or made of good sawn 

 material. Freedom from knots, and even fibre, are also here 

 the first conditions of suitability. 



3. Barrels for Dry Goods. 



Dry Goods' Barrels are employed for storing and transport of 

 all kinds of wares, such as salt, colours, cement, gypsum, sugar, 

 currants, figs, butter, lard, chemical preparations, &c., and are 

 usually made out of coniferous wood. 



Staves for these barrels are seldom split, but are usually 

 sawn pieces, half an inch thick, 2 — 6 inches broad and varying 

 in length ; poles, 4 — 4i inches in diameter at height of chest, 

 may be thus utilized. 



Larger wood, chiefly of beech, is used in Hungary and North 

 Germany for currant-, flour- and butter-barrels. 



Barrels for dry goods are chiefly made in factories, and there 

 are large factories at IVEiinden, Hannover, &c., for making 

 margarine barrels. Smaller barrels are made of papier-mache 

 with wooden headings. [The fig. on p. 174 shows a method 

 employed for splitting spruce-staves in the Jura. — Tr.] 



4. Barrd-lloops. 



Hoops for barrels are now-a-days increasingly made of iron, 

 but a large quantity of wooden hooping is still used. Coppice 

 poles of oaks, chestnuts, birch and hazel are used, and of 

 willows for the smaller casks. They should be felled before 

 the leaves are out. The coppice-shoots are cut with bill- 

 hooks, trimmed of all twigs and knots, and then split in halves. 

 When green they can be easily bent to the requisite shape, but 

 if dry must first be soaked in water. In the case of slack 

 barrels the hoops are chiefly made of pieces of the stem of ash, 

 spruce, or willow trees, 2 inches broad, and ^rd to frds of an 

 inch thick. They are cut smooth with a knife, plunged into 

 boiling water, and bent over a round piece of wood. 



Section XL — Sundry Uses of Split Wood. 



Some other articles besides casks and barrels are made of 

 split wood, or of wood treated in a somewhat similar manner. 



L 2 



