TEXTURE OF WOOD. 69 



plants, which are frequently so inconvenient or injurious to man, 

 are often used to protect his fields and plantations against wild 

 beasts and robbers, or even as bulwarks against hostile invasions. 

 Thus, Sir Emerson Tennent informs us that, during the existence 

 of the Kandyan kingdom, before its conquest by the British, 

 the frontier forests were so thickened and defended by dense 

 plantations of thorny plants as to form a natural fortification 

 impregnable to the feeble tribes on the other side ; and at each 

 pass which led to the level country, movable gates, formed of the 

 same thorny beams, were suspended as an ample security against 

 the incursions of the naked and timid lowlanders. 



The trunks and stems of the plants are far more important to 

 man than their roots, and in fact utterly indispensable to the 

 progress of civilization. The circumstance that a large propor- 

 tion of the cells of which they are formed acquire a ligneous 

 texture during the progress of their growth, or change into 

 tough and pliable fibres of a very considerable length, is of 

 paramount importance to the welfare of man ; for what would 

 have been his social condition if the reign of Flora had been 

 confined to plants of a humble growth or brittle texture. Navi- 

 gation would have remained unknown to him ; like a wild animal, 

 he would have been obliged to live in burrows or in caves ; 

 he would never have been enabled to manufacture any of the 

 instruments which agriculture, industry, and the mutual inter- 

 course of nations absolutely require ; he would always have re- 

 mained a miserable savage, the wretched lord of a wretched 

 inheritance. 



The difference of texture and consistency in the wood of dif- 

 ferent trees is likewise an object of high importance to man. 

 One kind of wood recommends itself to his notice by its strength 

 and hardness, another by its pliability; a third by the ease 

 with which it can be worked ; a fourth by its lightness : and 

 thus the carpenter, the ship-builder, the coach-maker, the turner, 

 and many other artizans find each of them the most suitable 

 materials for their several purposes among the various trees of 

 the forest. 



But the trunks of the trees are useful to man not only by their 

 solid and fibrous parts, but frequently also by the juices which 

 they contain, or the substances deposited in their cellular tissue. 

 Thus, they provide him with an amazing variety of dyeing 



