108 THE WILLOW AS A TIMBER TREE. u 



OTHER USES OF THE WILLOW. 



The value of the larger willows for lumber, &c., is scarcely yet realized 

 in this country. In England four species are found especially valuable 

 for certain uses. Thej' are — 



1. Salix alba, the white or Huntingdon willow, a fine tree which in 

 proper soil will, in twenty years, make an average of two cubic feet a 

 year. The wood is light, tough, easily worked, and proper for tool- 

 handles, hoops, cooper work, &c., and its bark is used for tanning, and 

 in medicine as a tonic and astringent, being recognized in our pharmaco- 

 poeias, and sometimes used as a substitute for Peruvian bark. Its active 

 principle, salicin, is also used as a remedy in intermittent fevers. This 

 willow has been already widely introduced, and in the ])rairie region of 

 the ISorthwest it is valued above all other trees as a windbreak. It 

 makes a very good fuel, and its wood is useful for a great variety of 

 purposes.^ 



2. Salix Ca]}rea, the goat-willow or saugh-tree, grows to a large size ; 

 its wood is tough and elastic, and takes a fine polish. It is worth in 

 market about as much as the birch, or the larch. Its bark it used for 

 tanning. 



3. Salix RusselUana, the Bedford willow, grows rapidly, attains a large 

 size, and its wood is deemed equal to that of the white willow, and by 

 some superior. 



4. Salix fragilis, red-wood willow. This has a light, tough, and dura- 

 ble wood, and grows to a large size, but when old is liable to die in the 

 top. Its heart-wood is reddish, from whence the common name. Its 

 specific name is given from the facility with which the twigs used for 

 basket-work break from the tree. The twigs themselves are tough and 

 pliable. 



Besides these species, worthy of notice for their woods, the osier-wil- 

 low {Salix nhninalis) is an important article in commerce for basket-mak- 

 ing, and the Salix lanceolata, largely used in Europe for hooi)s. The fol- 

 lowing article by M. Hanson, upon the cultivation of this willow in Nor- 

 way, abounds in useful information, and is suggestive of ideas applica- 

 ble in our own country i^ 



It is now some six years eiuce I began the cultivation of the native willows, especially 

 the Salix fragilis, which grows very thriftily in some of our northern districts, and 

 which I hoped to make useful. Af>er having planted many stocks, both in marshy 

 grounds and elsewhere, I found that although this willow grew well it did not render 

 the services which I had expected. I then turned my attention to the Dutch osier 



1 Professor Sargent mentions a willow between Stockbridge and Great Barrington, 

 Mass., planted, it is said, as a cutting in 1807, that now, at 4 feet from the ground is 

 21 feet 8 inches in ciKCumference. 



2 An English writer in speaking of the willows, says that the white willow, when 

 unpruned and grown naturally in favorable conditions, is the handsomest of the willow 

 family, whether we regard its general outline, habit, or the peculiar whiteness of its 

 foliage, which forms a pleasing contrast with the darker green of other trees. It 

 comes forward rapidly on deeji river banks and rich alluvial bottoms, too damp for 

 most other timber-trees. In Great Britain within a few years willow timber has come 

 universally into use as blocks for brakes in railroad cars, so that wood of good size 

 has become scarce and high-priced. The charcoal of all willowsof suitable size is used 

 in making gunpowder. Among other uses to which certain kinds of willow are used 

 in Europe, and for which it is especially adapted, are paddle-wheel floats, and for 

 shrouding water-wheels, cart-linings (being not liable to splinter), turner's uses, shoe- 

 lasts, withes for tying, «S:c. Something has been said of its incombustible properties, 

 but more than facts will justify. 



* Plantations of Willow in Norway, by M. Hanson (of Stavanger), read before the Soc 

 ImpcriaJe Zoiilogique cVAcdimatation^, of France, December 15, 1865, and translated from 

 their Bulletin, 2d ser., ii, 727. 



