THE SPRUCE FIR, 



383 



the red bark of a veteran Scotch Fir with a fiercer 

 glow, or stealing, few and far between, in slender 

 bars of gold along the tender grass."* 



The timber of the Spruce Fir has, for an un- 

 known period, been imported into Britain from 

 Norway, chiefly in the form of entire trunks, 

 which are used for scaflblding-poles, spars, oars, 

 and masts for small craft ; but partly, also, sawn 

 into planks or deals, known in common as white 

 deal, white Baltic deal, and white Christiania 

 deal, the wood having a red hue only when the 

 tree is grown in certain soils and situations. The 

 poles, spars, and oars are the thinnings of the 

 Norwegian woods ; and the deals and planks are 

 made from the larger trees which are left. The 

 slenderest poles are taken from the largest and 

 oldest woods, and are called seedlings ; they are 

 always found where the wood is most dense, and 

 very often close by the side of a larger tree. They 

 grow very tall and slender, wholly without 

 branches, except at the summit, and, though 

 often only a few inches in diameter, are of great 

 age. 



Nothing can be finer than the Spruce-timber of 

 the Alps, w^hich is so tough, that the natives are 

 actually in the habit of kindling fires about the 

 trees so as to burn them down, to save their own 

 trouble and the edges of the axe. 



In scattered forests," says Loudon, the snow 

 falling on the trees individually, is retained by 

 their branches, and when these are of great 

 length, often weighs them down and breaks them. 

 We have seldom been more gratified with winter 

 scenery than when passing through a Spruce Fir 



* " Letters from the Baltic." 



