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good appearance, while figured pieces are of great beauty. Easily workedj 

 soft, yet very durable. It would be difficult to exaggerate the good qualities 

 of this valuable timber. 



Principal uses. — ^The principal timber used in the Colony for the better 

 kinds of furniture and house-joinery. It would be impossible to enumerate 

 the uses to which it is put — afresh ones being continually found. A recent 

 use is for railway keys (between chair and rail). 



Distribution. — From the Shoalhaven to Queensland, but in greatest 

 abundance and best quality from the Bichmond Biver to the Tweed. 



Quantity available. — Only moderately plentiful, having Been such a 

 favourite timber for nearly a century. 



(b) Rosewood {Bysoxylon Fraserianum, Benth.) 



Name. — Because of the odour of the freshly cut timber. 



Characteristics. — Of a reddish colour, and has a neat figure. Has a 

 fragrant rose-odour when fresh, though the perfume is fugitive. A timber 

 of the mahogany class. Works splendidly. 



Principal uses. — Purniture, cabinet-work, turnery, carving, and indoor 

 work of all kinds. It is used for newels, mouldings, and framing of all 

 sorts. Useful for show-case work, also for planes, levers, trundles, and 

 studs in roller-boards of organs, &c., window-jambs, screws of hand-screws, 

 and any uses where a wood a little harder than softwood is required. 

 Eecent test uses are for bee-boxes, broom-handles, and wire-mattress frames. 

 Has been strongly recommended for wine casks. It will split, and I am 

 assured it imparts no taste to wine. Very durable and resistant to white 

 ant, e.g., often used for house-blocks in the Kempsey district. 



Distribution. — Brush forests, northern districts, from Wyong northwards. 



Quantity available. — Practically unlimited. I look upon this as a valuable 

 reserve timber. Its usefulness will be realised later on, when cedar is even 

 scarcer than it is. 



(c) Red Bean {Dysoxylon Muelleri, Benth,) 



Name. — To distinguish it from " black hea.n" (Oasfanospermum), but this 

 is quite unnecessary, as the two timbers are as different from each other as 

 they can well be. 



Gharacteristics. — Bed bean may be described as a scentless rosewood, of a 

 red colour, and possessing a neat figure. 



Principal uses. — This timber is often sold in Sydney as cedar or bastard 

 cedar, but it is of sufficient excellence to stand on its own merits. It is a 

 good furniture wood, and has a quiet yet handsome figure that looks well 

 under polish. It can be put to most of the uses that Spanish mahogany is 

 put. I have heard that it is considered valuable for the naves of wheels in 

 the districts in which it grows. 



Distribution. — Northern rivers, particularly the Clarence and Richmond. 

 Quantity available. — Not large. 



(d) Onionwood (Owenia cepiodora, P. v. M.) 



This is a useful wood of the cedar class— the wood, in fact, being often 

 sold as bastard cedar. The name is owing to the smell of the wood, which is 

 fugitive and therefore not offensive. Used for the same purposes as cedar. 

 Plentiful in the Bichmond Biver district, and scattered in nearly all the 

 brush forests of the Tweed. 



