TREES OF INDIANA. 
79 
elastic and is used for chair bottoms, and the Indians for¬ 
merly made baskets of its finely split fibres. It is a valua¬ 
ble rail timber. It is a hardy street tree but not orna¬ 
mental. 
Fagus ferruginea —American Beech. 
This handsome large tree is found in all parts of the 
State, on rich and poor soils alike. It is a fine grained 
wood, and owing to its uniform texture and extreme hard¬ 
ness, is popular in the manufacture of a great variety of 
tools. It is also employed as a choice building timber. 
The liability to rot in damp situations, so much complained 
of as regards the European beech, is not a fault of the 
American tree. While the white beech is a light, tough, 
springy tool timber, the red beech is a bridge timber of rare 
excellence, and has no superior for sills and pillars for the 
support of weights. It is also much employed in cabinet 
work and some kinds of furniture, and in musical 
instruments. 
It is but little used in the inside furnishing of houses,, 
but there are few woods which have a finer effect when 
finished and polished so as to show the natural grain of the 
wood. It is one of our most abundant and cheapest 
woods, and ranks next to the hickory and sugar maple in 
value for fuel. It is among the most cleanly and beautiful 
of shade trees, but being surface rooted will not bear 
tramping. When this can be avoided the beech will amply 
repay all the attention that can be paid to it as an orna¬ 
mental tree. 
d he u water beech ”— -carpinus —Horn-Beam—of small 
growth, is an extremely dense wood, stiff and strong, and 
ranks with the iron wood or horn-beam ( ostrya for levers 
or any use requiring strength and tenacity. 
Fraxinus Americana —White Ash 
F, quadranguluta —Blue Ash. 
