THE TIMBERS OF COMMERCE 



and taste none. Burns well and quietly : embers glow in still air 

 heat expels an orange-red juice. Solution faint, dirty brown. 



Grain. Open : very coarse, about the same as English Ash. 

 Surface bright, almost lustrous. 



Bark. Very similar to that of the English Ash when the 

 latter is old : i layer : not deeply fissured : reticulated in trans- 

 verse section : " flaking off in thin scales " (ioo). 



Uses, etc. " Furniture, interior-finishing, chair-bottoms, . . . 

 splits into laths when bent in small sticks " (49). " Not strong : 

 tough, compact, durable, separating easily into thin layers : 

 . . . fencing, barrel-hoops, cabinet-making " (100). 



Authorities. Sargent (100). Hough (49), vol. iii. p. 26. 

 Macoun (66), p. 317. Wiesner (131), L. 6, p. 134. 



Colour. Heart-wood, brown, of irregular contour, but well 

 defined from the brownish-white sap-wood. Much lighter in 

 shade in vertical section. 



Anatomical Characters. Transverse section : — 



Pores. Very prominent, size 1-2, rather coarse, very variable, 

 diminishing abruptly outside the Spring pore-ring : large pores, 

 3-5 rows deep and 6-10 per sq. mm. Small pores in groups of 

 as many as 7 : 12-19 per sq. mm. 



Rays. Need lens : 6-8 per mm. : brownish. 



Radial Section. Rays minute, brownish flakes, faint, yet 

 readily visible to the naked eye. 



Tangential Section. The rings appear as bands or fringed 

 loops of by no means coarse pores. 



Type specimen authenticated by Hough and also from a log 

 received from the Imperial Institute. 



The structure is identical with the wood of F. excelsior in all 

 other respects (see No. 140). 



No. 142. AMERICAN ASH. Fraxinus americana. 



Linn, 



Plate X. Big. 88. 



Natural Order. Oleaceae. 



Synonyms. F. acuminata, Lam. F. canadensis, Mich. F. 

 epiptera, Mich. F. americana, var. latifolia, Loud. 



Alternative Names. Green Ash (113). Quebec Ash, United 

 States Ash in England (60). White Ash (95). White River Ash 

 in Canada (12). Mountain Ash in Newfoundland (12). Black 

 Ash, White Ash in Nova Scotia (12) and in New Brunswick, 

 where it bears also the name of Red Ash. Weissesche in Ger- 

 many (131). 



Sources of Supply. As indicated by the names given above. 



Physical Characters, etc. Recorded dry- weight 37-52 lbs. per 



162 



