SPEARWOOD— SPRUCE 275 



Excellent for carriage-building, but used chiefly in sliip-building and 

 cabinet-work. 



Spearwood in Australia (i) Acacia homalophylla [See Myall (ii)], 

 (ii) A, doratoxylon and (iii) JEucal'^ptus doratoxylon. Acacia dora- 

 toxylon A, Cunn. (Order Leguminosce) is known also as '* Hickory, 

 Brigalow," or " Caariwan." Height 20 — 35 ft. ; diam. 6 — 12 in. 

 S.G. 1,215. Sapwood narrow, yellow ; heart dark-brown, very 

 heavy, hard, tough, close-grained, durable. Used for furniture, 

 carriage-poles, gates, etc., and, by the natives, for spears and 

 boomerangs. Eucalyptus doratoxylon P. v. M. (Order Myrtdcece). 

 South-West Australia. Height 60 — 80 ft. ; diam. 2 — 3 ft. Straight- 

 growing, hard, and elastic, for which qualities its saplings are much 

 valued by the aborigines for spears. 



Spindle-tree {Euonymus europmus L. : Order Celdstrdcece), Europe 

 Worth Africa, and Western Siberia. Height 5 — 20 ft. ; diam. small. 

 Clear yellowish- white, with distinct annual rings, but indistinguish- 

 able vessels or pith-rays, Hght, hard, tough, fine-grained, difficult to 

 split, but easily cut. Used in turnery for spindles, shoe-pegs, etc., 

 and yielding a fine crayon or gunpowder charcoal. 



Spruce, a name appHed originally to the Common or Norway 

 Spruce {Picia excelsa Link. = Pmw5 Abies L. = P. Picea I>uroi= 

 Abies excelsa BC. : Order Goniferce) from Pruce or Prussia, whence 

 it was obtained, and then extended to all the species of the genus 

 Picea and to a few other trees. Besides the fact of their cones 

 falling off whole, and other botanical characters, by which the 

 Spruces are distinguished as a genus from the Firs {Abies), their 

 wood, though varying in durability according to the soil on which 

 it is grown, has most of its characters common to all the species. 

 There is no distinct heartwood, the whole being of a whitish colour ; 

 the resin-ducts are few and small ; and the pith-rays have tracheids 

 with bordered pits for their upper and lower rows of cells, with four 

 rows of parenchyma having simple pits in the middle. The wood 

 is less resinous than Pine, though equal to some soft Pines, and 

 superior to Silver Eir as timber, superior to Pine for paper-pulp, 

 and much valued as a " resonance wood " for violins and sounding- 

 boards. So similar are the Baltic and Canadian Spruce that in 

 England each is used on that side of the country nearest to its 

 origin, and the price of one affects that of the other. 



The principal Spruces are as follows : 



European — 



Common - . . - Picea excelsa Link. 



Northern or Baltic var. - septentriondlis. 



Polar var. - - - boredUs. 



Servian or Omorikan - - P. Omorica Pancic. 



Oriental - - - - P. orientdlis Carri^re. 



18—2 



