iv.] . HEART-SHAKE. 27 



a very objectionable form. These species are among 

 the hard and strong woods used for architectural pur- 

 poses in this country, and by cabinet-makers for the 

 manufacture of furniture, and for other domestic uses. 



As regards the white or softer woods, it is generally 

 very small in the Dantzic, but extensive and open in 

 Riga and Swedish Fir. In the Pines, the Canadian Red 

 is perhaps the closest and least of all affected by it, the 

 Canadian Yellow coming next in order; but in the 

 Pitch Pine of the Southern States of North America it 

 is often present in a more enlarged form, and the centre, 

 or pith, of this species cannot well be approached if thin 

 boards are required to be cut from it. 



This defect, as before mentioned, affects and pervades 

 more or less nearly every description of timber ; it is 

 common to all the exogenous trees, and neither age, 

 soil, nor situation appears to have anything to do with 

 its origin. It must consequently be accepted as an 

 arrangement in the natural order of things for which 

 there is no help, and our study should be to so utilise 

 the trees possessing it in its most extensive and objec- 

 tionable form, as to employ them for purposes which 

 require their full growth, doing as little as possible to 

 them if we wish to convert the logs profitably. The 

 heart-shake is, nevertheless, so very insignificant in some 

 timber, that many persons, not professionally educated 

 to the work, might look at a log without suspecting its 

 presence. Others, again, if they did discover it, would 

 hardly consider it to be of any importance, as it is often 

 so small that the blade of a penknife could scarcely be 

 thrust into it. 



There are, however, several varieties of timber which 

 have it, not in an insignificant form or shape, but 

 extending from the pith to a distance of about two- 



