igo TIMBER AND TIMBER TREES. [CHAP. 



the grain being close and long, with occasionally a 

 rowiness, or figure, in it, and is also very free from 

 defects. The Attaran Teak is rather stunted in growth 

 •compared with the varieties just mentioned, but is of 

 fully the same circumference. The wood is brownish 

 in colour, dense, hard, and resembles very much the 

 Malabar Teak. It is heavier than either the Thoungyeen 

 or Karanee, and is also coarser and more knotty, owing 

 to the branches occurring lower down the stem. Some 

 of these, from accident or otherwise, get broken off, and 

 defects, arising from the moisture lodging in the 

 ruptured parts, are not unfrequent in it. 



The Laingbooe Teak has a most peculiar growth, 

 and deviates strangely from the ordinary cylindrical 

 form, in having its stem twisted and deeply grooved, or 

 fluted. It consequently takes a tree of rather large size 

 to yield a small straight square log, and when obtained 

 it is but an indifferent one, owing to the fibre of the 

 grain having been cut and weakened by the hewing of 

 an irregular form or shape into a regular one. In colour 

 this wood is rather darker than any of the others, and it 

 is also considerably harder and heavier. 



The Irrawaddy or Rangoon Teak timber is of a pale 

 yellow colour, very closely resembling the Thoungyeen 

 Teak of the Moulmein district in its uniformity of 

 texture, and in having a long straight grain. It is a 

 clean free kind of wood, with the centre commonly 

 softer and more spongy than the outer annual layers. 

 In consequence of this it cuts transversely, with a coarse- 

 ness and fluffiness of surface near the pith which is 

 remarkable ; this, I consider, may be taken as indicative 

 of poorness or inferiority in the quality.* 



* The dealers in Rangoon Teak would say that the soft spongy appear- 

 ance is of no consequence, as it is merely caused by the workmen having 



