116 
CYPRESS. 
more, where they are also procured at equal prices, the preference is given 
to. those of White Cedar. This fact seems to support the conclusion that 
each unites the principles which ensure durability only in the soil and cli- 
mate in which they respectively abound. 
In the towns of the Southern States where the White Pine is cheap, it 
has in a great measure taken the place of the Cypress for the interior 
work of houses ; but Cypress boards are still preferred for the inside of 
brick houses, and for window-sashes, and the panels of doors exposed to 
the weather : cabinet-makers also choose it for the inside of mahogany 
furniture. 
I have been assured that in Louisiana it is found highly proper for the 
masts and sides of vessels, and it has the same reputation in Charleston 
and Savannah, though at present it is little employed. Wherever it grows 
it is chosen for canoes, which are fashioned from a single trunk and are 30 
feet long and 5 feet wide, light, solid, and more durable than those of any 
other tree. 
On the banks of the Mississippi it is used to enclose plantations, and 
posts made of the perfect wood last a long time in the ground. For this 
last it is preferred to every other tree in those districts of Georgia in which 
it abounds or is easily procured. It makes the best pipes to convey water 
under ground ; especially the Black Cypress, which is more resinous and 
solid. 
The inexhaustible Cypress-swamps on the Mississippi not only supply 
materials for every species of building in Lower Louisiana, but furnish for 
exportation to the West Indies. This branch of commerce, which con- 
sisted principally of boards and shingles, has declined within a few years, 
in consequence of the great exportation from the Northern States of dif- 
ferent species of Pine, particularly the White Pine, which are sold at half 
the price and devoted to nearly the same uses. 
At the Havanna, the White Pine has generally superseded the Cypress 
for sugar-cases, for which it was once extensively used ; for the covering of 
houses Cypress shingles are still preferred, and the consumption in the 
French, English and Danish Colonies is estimated at one hundred millions 
of shingles annually, of which the greater part come from Norfolk, Wil- 
mington and Savannah : more than fifteen millions have been brought in a 
single year from Norfolk, and more than thirty millions from Wilmington. 
They are 22 or 44 inches long, and from 3 to 6 inches wide : in February 
1808, the price of the longest was from $4 to $5 a thousand at Philadel- 
phia, and they usually bear a double price in the West Indies. 
In Europe, the patrons of useful culture and ornamental gardening have 
labored zealously for more than fifty years to multiply the Cypress. 
Many of them are of opinion that, as it supports the winter of Paris and 
even of Belgium and England, it might be profitably planted in many 
