CHAPTER I. 



TIMBER : ITS STRUCTURE, IDENTIFICATION, COMPOSITION, TECHNICAL 

 PROPERTIES, PRACTICAL USES, AND MARKET VALUE. 



Timber has no generally accepted definition. As distinguished 

 from fuel, it is wood used for any technical purpose. For rail- 

 way freight it includes " all descriptions of wood in an unmanu- 

 factured, or roughly hewn, or roughly sawn state ; but not any 

 wood shaped, or prepared, or partially prepared." As dis- 

 tinguished from coppice, with or without standards, it in 

 English law includes all woods and trees not cut in regular 

 rotation ; though Beechwoods in England, cleared and naturally 

 regenerated every ninety to one hundred years, can be used by 

 the heir-in-possession of a settled estate, through local habit and 

 custom, without impeachment for waste a restriction not 

 applying to timber on Scottish entailed estates. Again, in 

 selling trees, local custom usually classes as timber only what 

 measures not less than 5 or 6 in. in quarter-girth (20 to 24 in. 

 in girth) under bark, or frequently in Scotland to 6 in. in 

 diameter free of bark ; while pitwood is measured down to 

 2J in. diameter under bark, or 3 in. over bark at the thin end. 

 Tops and branches below the local customary timber dimensions 

 are not paid for (see also Part II., pp. 89-91). 



The technical properties of timber depend mainly on its 

 anatomical structure and its chemical composition, and are 

 evidenced in its outward appearance, its material condition, 

 and its relation towards external influences^ 



