52 
TIMBER 
attains a greater height than 12 to 14 ft., but in warmer 
dimates is found of twice this size. The wood is heavier 
than any European wood, and some of it will sink in water ; 
the colour is a beautiful yellow or orange ; it is hard, close 
and silky in grain, easily worked, and takes a tine polish. 
It is much used by the turner and wood carver — referred 
to by Virgil as " proper for the turner's trade " — and in 
the manufacture of rules and drawing scales, also for 
planes, handles of turnscrews and other tools, and is pre- 
ferred to any other wood for flutes and other wind instru- 
ments. It was the chief wood used for wood engraving 
when that process was much more common than it is 
to-day, admitting as it does of a finish as fine almost as that 
of metal. It is about the most solid at the pith of any wood 
to be met with — the pith of all true boxwoods is lozenge 
shaped in section ; the wood is cold and smooth to the 
touch, the bark and sap together are only about the thick- 
ness of stout cardboard. The box of commerce now 
comes chiefly from the Caucasus and parts of Turkey in 
Asia, but the supply is scarce and dear, and a good deal 
of persimmon and other timber is used in place of box. 
The true box can only be had in short lengths up to 6 ft., 
and from 2^ to 12 inches in diameter ; it is usually sold by 
weight. 
Weight up to 72 lbs. per cubic foot. 
Ash is a wood of which there are about fifty species, 
natives of Europe and North America as well as Asia and 
Japan. 
The Common Ash {Fraxinus excelsior) is a beautiful and 
umbrageous tree, but extremely injurious to grass and 
crops immediately under and around it. The wood is 
greyish or brownish white with longitudinal yellow streaks. 
