506 
FOXWORTHY. 
numerous, the distance between them less than the diameter of the pores. 
Occasionally very short, line, white, concentrically running lines, espe- 
cially in the sapwood. Structural work, rice-pounders and firewood. 
Gamb. 61. 
Kayea stylosa Thw. 
Ceylon. 
Wood red, moderately hard and very heavy. Pores moderate-sized, in 
radial strings, which are more or less in echelon and rather scanty. 
Pith-rays very fine, indistinct. Very fine concentric bands of soft texture 
across the rays. 
Gamb. 59. 
DIPTEROCARPACE2E. 
This is, by far, the most important family of the Orient. It is 
probable that this one group produces more commercial wood than all 
others of the region together. ' The trees here are often of large size and 
they constitute a. larger percentage of merchantable stand than is the way 
with most other groups, outside of the mangrove swamps. In places, as 
some of the dipterocarp forests in India, certain species form almost 
pure stands ( sal and eng forests in Burma). 
“The most striking peculiarity of this order is, that numerous species 
are gregarious, forming nearly pure forests of large extent, in which one 
species has obtained the upper hand, to the exclusion of almost all others. 
In the tropical forests of eastern Asia, these species play the part which 
in Europe belongs to trees of Conifer* and Cupulifer* — the Scotch pine, 
the mountain pine, the spruce, and the beech. The most remarkable of 
these gregarious species is the sal tree, Shorea robusla, which forms pure 
or nearly pure forests of vast extent at the foot of the Himalaya, from 
Assam to the Punjab, and in the hills of eastern central India extending 
south to near the Godavery River. In a climate and on soil which suits 
it, this tree reigns supreme.” (Brandis Enumeration of the l'Jipterocar- 
paceae. Journ. Linn. Soc. Bot. 31: (1895).) 
Very often a number of dipterocarp species are found making up a 
very large percentage of a given stand. 
Many leguminous species have very ornamental- wood which is in 
great demand for furniture and cabinet work, but they do not supply 
anything like the quantity of wood furnished by the dipteroc-arps. It 
is this plentiful supply of usable timber which puts the dipterocarps 
far in the lead among the oriental timber-producing families. 
In many sections the dipterocarps predominate to such an extent that 
the market conditions would not be seriously changed if all other kinds 
of wood were taken from the market. It is not to be understood, from 
what has just been said, that the dipterocarps are unsuited for furniture 
and cabinet work. There are some members of the family which can be 
