TURPENTINE AND ROSIN. 211 



acid converts it into a crystalline substance, like camphor. It is employed 

 extensively in varnishes, paints, &c, and also in medicine. 



After the trees have been cut down, split up, and dried, the application 

 of fire-heat produces tar, the solid part of which is separated from the liquid 

 by boiling, and becomes pitch. Turpentine is obtained from boxes cut in 

 the standing green trees, about a foot from the ground, into which the sap 

 descends through slight incisions made into the tree, immediately above, 

 with an instrument especially constructed for this purpose. The process of 

 boxing, chipping, and preparing barrels for shipment, is thus described by 

 an old hand at the business : 



" Box the tree after the sap has gone down, and stop before it rises ; 

 therefore, it will require more hands to box than it will to work the trees. 

 A good hand will cut from 50 to 60 quart boxes a day ; some expert axemen, 

 in practice, may cut 100, but it is very seldom such hands are to be found. 

 Care should be taken to cut the box on the straight side of the tree. Some 

 trees will contain from 1 to 4 boxes, owing to the size of it. Care should be 

 taken to leave from 4 to 6 inches of sap and bark between faces, so as to 

 preserve the life of the tree. Cut the box from 4 to 4^ inches deep, about 

 8 inches wide. Go down the stump of the tree, so as to cut the heart as 

 little as possible. Clean out the chips and bark from the boxes, that your 

 turpentine may be free of them. The next work, after the box is cut, is to 

 gouge, or corner by a few chops, commencing in the edge of the box, 

 running up the tree, widening it at the same time, so as to make a channel 

 for the turpentine to run into the boxes. If the face is nearly a foot wide, 

 say from ten to eleven inches, then your boxes, or at least a part of them, 

 will fill quickly ; and you should have your barrels ready, so as to dip as 

 fast as the boxes fill. The next work after the cornering is to be done with 

 a hatchet, made for the purpose ; then comes the round shave — you chip off 

 two or three times with a hatchet, keeping the face smooth, then begin the 

 round shave. Never go into the tree more than two and a half or three 

 grains of the wood, and that should be repeated every eight or nine days, 

 never going up the tree more than one-eighth of an inch at a chipping — 

 that is, with the round shave — the only object is to keep the old cut fresh. 

 You may go over every seven days, as many persons do. A hand can 

 chip over his task in five days ; some will in less time. Twenty-five 

 hundred is a task for a good hand ; then he has two days to dip. If his 

 trees run well, and are thick, he can dip three barrels a day ; if not, from 

 two to two and a half. The timber for barrels should be got in the winter 

 — staves thirty-two inches long, the heading wide, so as to make, when 

 round, seventeen and a half inches across. A common cooper will make 

 from four to six good barrels a day. An average to the hand is 200 barrels 

 per year, which vary in price from two and a half to four dollars per 

 barrel." 



Another practical man describes the method of preparation still more 

 fully, as follows : 



" A good crop season, with occasional showers, is about the most 

 V Q 2 



