PINETUM DANICUM. 



395 



best kind, being a clay mixed with sand and other earths ; it is light 

 and moist, preserving these qualities to the depth of some feet. The 

 valleys, the crevices of the mountains, and banks of rivers are 

 the storehouses, as it were, into which the rains and melted snows 

 in the spring carry down the fattest i)arts of the soil of the higher 

 lands. 



The wood of this species is more employed in America than 

 that of any other Pine. Throughout the Northern States, at the 

 time the younger Michaux published his "North American Sylva" 

 (1819), seven-tenths of the houses, except in the larger capitals, 

 were of wood, and about three-quarters of these were built almost 

 entirely of White Pine ; and even in the cities the beams and 

 principal woodwork of the houses were of this wood. "The orna- 

 mental work of the outer doors, the cornices and friezes of apartments, 

 and the mouldings of fireplaces, all of which in America are elegantly 

 wrought, are of this wood. It receives gilding well, and is, therefore, 

 selected for looking-glass and picture frames. Sculptors employ it 

 exclusively for the images that adorn the bows of vessels, for which 

 they prefer the kind called the Pumpkin Pine. At Boston, and in 

 other towns of the Northern States, the inside of mahogany furniture 

 and of trunks, the bottoms of Windsor chairs of an inferior quality, 

 water-pails, a great part of the boxes used for packing goods, the 

 shelves of shops, and an endless variety of other objects are made of 

 White Pine. In the district of Maine it is employed for barrels to 

 contain salted fish, especially the kind called the Sapling Pine, which 

 is of a stronger consistence. For the magnificent wooden bridges over 

 the Schuylkill at Philadelphia and the Delaware at Trenton, and for 

 those which unite Cambridge and Charlestown with Boston, of which 

 the first is 1,500 feet, and the second 3,000 feet in length, the White 

 Pine has been chosen for its durability. It serves exclusively for the 

 masts of the numerous vessels constructed in the Northern and 

 Middle States, and for this purpose it would be difficult to replace it 

 in North America. The principal superiority of White Pine masts over 

 those brought from Piga is their lightness, but they have less strength, 

 and are said to decay more rapidly between decks and at the point 

 of intersection of the yards. This renders the Long-leaved Pine 

 (P. australis) superior to the White Pine, in the opinion of the greater 

 part of the American shipbuilders ; but some of them assert that the 

 White Pine would be equally durable if the top were carefully pro- 

 tected from the weather. With this view, an experiment has been 

 suggested, of a hole, several feet deep, made in the top of the mast, 

 filled with oil and hermetically sealed ; the oil is said to be absorbed 

 in a few months. The bowsprits and yards of ships-of-war are of this 

 species. The wood is not resinous enough to furnish turpentine for 

 commerce " (J. C. Loudon, " Arboretum 



Michaux states that P. Strohus grows in America to the height of 



