260 SIGNS AND SEASONS 



the color of the wood, which is dark amber color), 

 a most pleasing effect is produced. 



Butternut is the softest and most tractable of 

 what are called hard woods, and its hue is emi- 

 nently warm and mellow. Its figure is pointed 

 and shooting, — a sort of Gothic style in the grain. 

 It makes admirable doors. Western butternut, 

 which can usually be had in the Albany market, 

 makes doors as light as pine, and as little liable 

 to spring. The Western woods are all better 

 than the Eastern for building purposes. They are 

 lighter, coarser, easier worked. They grow easier 

 and thriftier. The traveler through northern Ohio 

 and Indiana sees a wonderful crop of forest trees, 

 tall, uniform, straight as candles, no knots, no 

 gnarls, — all clear, clean timber. The soil is deep 

 and moist, and the trees grow rank and rapid. The 

 chestnut, ash, and butternut grown here work like 

 pine, besides being darker and richer in color than 

 the same woods grown in leaner and more rocky 

 soils. Western black ash is especially beautiful. 

 In connection with our almost bone-white sugar 

 maple for panels, it makes charming doors, — just 

 the thing for chambers, and scarcely more expensive 

 than pine. Of our Eastern woods, red cedar is also 

 good, with its pungent, moth-expeUing odor, and 

 should not be neglected. It soon fades, but it is 

 very pleasing, with its hard, solid knots, even then. 

 No doubt some wash might be applied that would 

 preserve its color. 



There is a species of birch growing upon our 



