372 PROPERTIES AND USES OF TIMBER. 



I now proceed to notice the various properties of 

 different kinds of wood, and the uses to which the 

 respective kinds are applicahle. 



OAK. 



Oak is among the different kinds of timber what 

 iron is among the metals, — the most durable, the 

 most general in its application, and the most uni- 

 versally diffused over the surface of the globe, if 

 the various species be taken into account. Some 

 timber is harder, some is rent with greater diffi- 

 culty, and some will bear a greater strain without 

 breaking crosswise ; but none possesses all these qua- 

 lities in an equal degree with the oak. In former 

 ages this tree was used throughout Great Britain in 

 every department of carpentry, and our ancestors 

 had not only ships of oak, but oaken roofs, oaken 

 floors, oaken doors, and oaken furniture of every de- 

 scription. It is still employed for several purposes 

 in machinery, and beams of it are occasionally in- 

 troduced into roofs and other erections, where great 

 strength is required ; but the principal use to which 

 it is now applied, especially when of home growth, 

 is ship-building, — a department in which its place 

 can be but indifferently supplied by any other kind 



