64 OUR VANISHING FORESTS 



industry or may be further refined for medicinal 

 purposes, while the pure tar which remains is 

 largely sold for caulking ships. 



Soft-wood distillation has a great future in the 

 south as a means of utilizing not only the waste of 

 the lumbering industry, but also the stumps obtained 

 in clearing the ground for agricultural purposes. 

 Recently considerable attention has been given to 

 the manufacture of portable distillation retorts, by 

 the use of which the farmer or other land owner, 

 who desires to get rid of tree stumps, may obtain at 

 least a partial return for his trouble and labor. In 

 some instances such operations appear to have been 

 quite profitable. 



A similar and even older use of certain varieties 

 of wood is in the manufacture of dyes. Vegetable 

 or tree dyes preceded modern aniline dyes by many 

 years and were until about 1865 the principal source 

 of all our dye stuffs. With aniline dye competition 

 the trade fell off, but in 1914 with the outbreak of 

 war and the practical cessation of aniline imports, 

 vegetable dyes again attained considerable impor- 

 tance. 



Butter-nut as a dye material was well known to 

 the American pioneers who probably learned of its 

 quality from the Indians, but the yellowish color is 

 not very satisfactory. The Red Man, too, through 



