132 TIMBER 
in regard to its appearance, at others, by the attacks of 
small worms ; with a consequent depreciation in its value. 
Interesting as this work is in the Central American 
districts, it is perhaps more so in regard to the extraction 
of this wood from the dark and comparatively little 
known forests of the West Coast of Africa. There is a 
mysterious glamour about these forest regions which 
attracts interest, for little is known about them 
owing to their vast extent, the wonderful wealth of 
woods they contain, and the short period of time since a 
dark space marked their locality in our atlases. 
Those who come in contact with the wood from these 
regions, whether in the log as it has been shipped; ina 
converted form as it reaches the consumer ; or as furniture 
in the office or household, have little conception of the 
amount of labour entailed nor the many vicissitudes 
through which the wood has passed since it grew in 
lordly pride as a monarch perhaps among other huge 
trees in some dense, dark, and little trodden forest. 
‘Very often the tree from which a log has been produced 
has grown hundreds of miles from the coast, perhaps 
two or three miles from a waterway, and as the transport 
has to be performed entirely by human labour, and the 
logs weigh up to about 5 tons, it may be imagined the 
amount of-toil and endurance which has to be expended 
in this steaming tropical climate before the log reaches 
the first stage of its journey to the various markets 
of the world. 
Europeans of English and French nationality, and 
also one American firm, are principally interested in 
the outget of this wood, and have their agencies at many 
places which serve as ports along this great extent of 
territory. All the labour in the forests, however, is 
done by native ‘‘ boys” with, in many cases, white 
superintendents over them. 
