SECRETARY'S REPORT. 159 



this process they arc subject to much injury : first, by the mode 

 of catching them as they come from the mill sluices, the rafters 

 making use of a picaroon, or pole, with a spike in the end of 

 it, which is repeatedly and unmercifully driven into the boards, 

 taking out, perhaps, a piece at each time ; secondly, by the 

 holes made by the pins driven into the boards in rafting; and, 

 thirdly, by the rocks, and rapids, and shallows in the river 

 breaking the rafts to pieces and splitting up the boards as 

 they descend. These inconveniences will be partly remedied 

 by the railroad now in operation, unless other inconveniences 

 in the use of it should be found to overbalance them. 



" The kinds of timber brought down our rivers arc pine, 

 spruce, hemlock, ash, birch, maple, cedar and hackmatack. 

 Far the greater part of it is pine. The lumberers make about 

 six kinds of pine, though they do not agree exactly in the 

 classification or in the use of some of the names. The most 

 common division is into pumpkin pine, timber pine, sapling, 

 bull sapling,-" Norway, and yellow, or pitch pine. The pump- 

 kin pine stands preeminent in the estimation of the lumberers, 

 because it is the largest tree, and makes fine, large, clear boards. 

 They are soft and of a yellowish cast. The timber pine and 

 saplings are the most common. The former is generally pre- 

 ferred, as being larger and more likely to be sound ; yet the 

 saplings are said to make the harder and more durable boards. 

 The common sapling grows in low lands, generally very thick, 

 but much of it is apt to be rotten. The bull sapling is larger 

 and sounder, grows on higher land, and is mixed with hard wood. 

 The Norway pine t is a much harder kind of timber than the 

 others. It is seldom sawed into boards, though it makes excel- 

 lent floor boards, but it is generally hewn into square tim- 

 ber. In the Provinces it bears a higher price than the others. 

 There is not much of it brought to market, and it is not very 

 abundant in the woods. The yellow pine is very scarce, if to 

 be found at all, in that region. 



" I will conclude with some remarks upon the different modes 



* All the kinds here named, with the exception of the last tM'o, are varieties 

 of white pine. 



t This pine is called also red pine, from the color of its bark. 



