Trees — The Character, Structure, Sec. 57 



remarks were published. Perhaps the licst conclusion is a happy 

 combination of both, because the i»roperties of one so largely 

 supplement those of the other. 



Names of TiAniKKs. 



The multiplicity of common and trade names of timbers is 

 so bewildering and misleading that one is forced to wonder why 

 Architects and others, whose duty it is to draw up specifications, 

 do not recognize the importance of botanical names in order that 

 the timber wanted may be properly defined and many difficulties 

 avoided ; especially is this important noAv that new kinds of 

 timbers may be used in place of others. Timbers from different 

 countries frequently go under different names, making it appear 

 that they arc more numerous than is actually the case, and often 

 they are brought from afar because the same species nearer at 

 hand is not recognized by its local name. Moreover popular and 

 native names may in the course of time (lisap))ear and be replaced 

 by others. 



What we call Pitchpine {Piniis jjalustris) has something like 

 30 common names, and in America is usually called l^onglcaf or 

 (xeoi'gian Pine, their pitchpine being Pinus rigida, an inferior 

 species. Weymouth Pine (P. strobus) is known on our market as 

 Yellow Pine, but is called in America White Pine. The wood of 

 Douglas Fir, {Pseudo-tsuga Douglasii) if wide-ringed, is usually 

 reddish and is known as "' red-fir" and " Oregon pine," and the 

 popular belief is that these timbers come from different species 

 of trees whereas the two grades are obtained from the same 

 species. Intermediate grades are also common. " Southern 

 Pine " of the United States includes three species. An Architect 

 specifying for Southern Pine may be supplied with any or all of 

 the pines in question. 



The name " Mahogany " is not now confined, as it originally 

 was, to a single species, (Swietenia Mahagoni) but to a number 

 of timbers from many different genera and species of trees which 

 differ widely in anatomical structure. Some 70 kinds of timber 



