520 



THE PRACTICAL GARDENER. 



centuries. According to Thucydides, the coffins used by the 

 Athenians, for their dead heroes, were made of this wood ; as 

 also the chests which contained the Egyptian mummies. The 

 doors of St. Peter's church, at Rome, were originally made of 

 this wood, and after lasting eleven hundred years, they pre- 

 sented, at the end of that time, not the least symptom of de- 

 cay. They were removed by order of Pope Eugenius the 

 Fourth, and gates of brass were substituted in their place. 



The durability of the larch is now well ascertained, and 

 when properly seasoned, it is not liable to warp, nor cast, as 

 it is technically called ; and, when of a proper age, it might be 

 used as a durable timber for hot-house building. Its durability 

 was known to the ancients, who describe it as lasting for nearly 

 a thousand years. 



Innumerable instances are recorded, and which daily pre- 

 sent themselves to our notice, of the durability of deal tim- 

 ber; and when that wood is highly charged with oleaginous 

 or resinous matter, it is known to last for many years, and 

 is well calculated for hot-house building, as having but a slight 

 tendency to warp or shrink, however openly it may be ex- 

 posed. We are much disposed to believe timber of this de- 

 scription to be more durable for hot-house building, than metal 

 of any of the sorts which have hitherto been used ; and while 

 it is exempt from the charge of being a conductor of excessive 

 heat, cold, or electrical matter, it is also not liable to contract- 

 ion nor expansion. Rust never atiects it, the droppings of 

 which on the foliage of plants is extremely injurious ; neither 

 is the expense so great in the first erection, and any accidental 

 injury sustained in it can be more readily rectified. The 

 capability of good timber to support any reasonable weight 

 which is ever likely to be applied to the roofs of hot-houses, is 

 such as to warrant, with all safety, the rafters and sashes 

 being made sufficiently slender, to admit as much light to the 

 plants as is ever required, on any reasonable occasion. It 

 has been stated, that if one-third of the sum requisite to keep 

 a wooden-house properly painted, be expended on an iron 

 roof, no injury would ever be sustained, from the liability of 

 that metal to suffer from rust, but this is not the case. The 

 disposition of rust to eat its way through paint is so obvious, 



