twenty-five or thirty species of huckleberry in this country. The
cranberry is one of the best known species. The range of tree
huckleberry extends from North Carolina to Texas, and it reaches its
largest size in the latter state where trunks thirty feet high and
ten inches in diameter occur, but not in great abundance. The fruit
which this tree bears has some resemblance to the common
huckleberry, but is inferior in flavor, besides being dry and
granular. It ripens in October and remains on the branches most of
the winter. The fruit is about a quarter of an inch in diameter,
dark and lustrous, and is a conspicuous and tempting bait for
feathered inhabitants of swamp and forest. The bark of the roots is
sometimes used for medicine, and that from the trunk for tanning,
but it is too scarce to become important in the leather industry.
The tree is known in different parts of its range as farkleberry,
sparkleberry, myrtle berry, bluet, and in North Carolina it is known
as gooseberry. The wood is hard, heavy, and very compact; is liable
to warp, twist, and check in drying; polishes with a fine, satiny
finish. Medullary rays are numerous, broad, and conspicuous; wood
light brown, tinged with red. Small articles are turned from it.
[Illustration]
OSAGE ORANGE
[Illustration: OSAGE ORANGE]
OSAGE ORANGE
(_Toxylon Pomiferum_)
Osage orange belongs to the mulberry family. There are fifty-four
genera, three of which are found in the United States, the mulberries,
the Osage orange, and the figs. Osage orange is known by several names,
the principal one of which refers to the Osage Indians, who formerly
lived in the region where the tree grows. It is called orange because
the fruit, which is from two to five inches in diameter, looks like a
green orange, but it is unfit for food. In its range most people call it
bodark or bodock, that being a corruption of the name by which the
French designated it, bois d’arc, which means bow wood. It was so called
from the fact that Indians made bows of it when they could get nothing
better. Its value as material for bows seems to be traditional and
greatly overestimated. It is lower in elasticity than white oak and very
much lower than hickory, and, theoretically, at least, it is not well
suited for bows. The wood is known also as mock orange, bow-wood, Osage
apple tree, yellow-wood, hedge, and hedge tree. The last name is given
because many hedges have been made of it.
Osage orange has been planted in perhaps every state of the Union, and
grows successfully in most of them. It is one of the most widely
distributed of American forest trees, but its distribution has been
chiefly artificial. It was found originally in a very restricted region,
from which it was carried for hedge and ornamental planting far and
wide. Its natural home, to which it was confined when first discovered,
embraced little more than ten thousand square miles, and probably half
of that small area produced no trees of commercial size. Its northern
limit was near Atoka, Oklahoma, its southern a little south of Dallas,
Texas; a range north and south of approximately one hundred miles. Its
broadest extent east and west was along Red River, through Cooke,
Grayson, Fanning, Lamar, and Red River counties, Texas, about 120 miles.
Some Osage orange of commercial size grew outside the area thus
delimited, but no large amount. Much of that region, particularly south
of Red River, was prairie, without timber of any kind; but scattered
here and there were belts, strips, thickets, and clumps of Osage orange
mixed with other species. On the very best of its range, and before
disturbed by white men, this wood seldom formed pure stands of as much
as 100 acres in one body, and since the country’s settlement, the stands
have become smaller or have been entirely cleared to make farms. All
accounts agree that the Osage orange reaches its highest development on
the fertile lands along Boggy and Blue rivers in Oklahoma, though fine
bodies of it once grew south of the Red River in Texas, and much is
still cut there though the choicest long ago disappeared. Few trees are
less exacting in soil, yet when it can make choice it chooses the best.
In its natural habitat it holds its place in the black, fertile flats
and valleys, and is seldom found on sandy soil. It is not a swamp tree,
though it is uninjured by occasional floods. The tracts where it grows
are sometimes called “bodark swamps,” though marshy in wet weather only.
The tree attains a height of fifty or sixty feet when at its best, but
specimens that tall are unusual. Trunks are occasionally two or three
feet in diameter, but that size is very rare. At the present time
probably ten trees under a foot in diameter are cut for every one over
that size.
Rough and unshapely as Osage trees are, they have been more closely
utilized than most timbers. Fence posts are the largest item. The board
measure equivalent of the annual cut of posts has been placed at
18,400,000. The posts are shipped to surrounding states, in addition to
fencing nearly 40,000 square miles of northern Texas and southern
Oklahoma. Houseblocks constitute another important use. These are short
posts set under the corners of buildings in place of stone foundations.
The annual demand for this kind of material amounts to about 1,000,000
board feet. An equal amount goes into bridge piling. The principal
demand comes from highway commissioners. Telephone poles take a
considerable quantity, and insulator pins more.
One of the most important uses of Osage orange is found in the
manufacture of wagon wheels, though the total quantity so used is
smaller than that demanded for fence posts.
About 10,000 or 12,000 wagons with Osage orange felloes or rims are
manufactured annually in the United States. That use of the wood is not
new. It began in a small way soon after the settlement of the region. At
first the work was hand-done by local blacksmiths and wheelwrights. They
found the wood objectionable, from the workman’s standpoint, on account
of its extreme hardness and the difficulty of cutting it. That objection
is still urged against it though machines have taken the place of the
hand tools of former times. Saws and bits are quickly dulled, and the
cost of grinding, repair, and replacement increases the operator’s
expense much above ordinary mill outlay for such purposes. On that
account many prefer to work the wood green. It is then softer, and cuts
more smoothly. If seasoned before it is passed through the machines it
is liable to “pull.” That term is used to indicate a rough-breaking of
the fibres by the impact of knives. The readiness with which the wood
splits calls for extraordinary care in boring it, and many felloes are
spoiled in finishing them to receive the tenoned ends of spokes.
A number of commodities are made of Osage orange but in quantities so
small that the total wood used does not constitute a serious drain upon
the supply. Police clubs are occasionally made as a by-product of the
rim mill. Some years ago at the Texas state fair at Dallas, a piano was
exhibited, all visible wood being Osage orange, handsomely polished. The
rich color of this wood distinguishes it from all other American
species. When oiled it retains the yellow color, but unoiled wood fades
on long exposure. Clock cases of Osage have been manufactured locally,
and gun stocks made of it are much admired, though the wood’s weight is
an argument against it for gun stocks. Canes split from straight-grained
blocks, and shaved and polished by hand, are occasionally met with, but
none manufactured by machinery have been reported. Sawmills in the Osage
orange region use the wood as rollers for carriages and off-bearing
tables. Rustic rockers and benches of the wood, with the bark or without
it, figure to a small extent in local trade. It has been tried
experimentally for parquetry floors, with satisfactory results. Sections
of streets have been paved with Osage orange blocks. The wood wears well
and is nearly proof against decay, but no considerable demand for such
blocks appears ever to have existed. Railroads which were built through
the region years ago cut Osage for ties and culvert timber, but no such
use is now reported. The demand for the wood for tobacco pipes is
increasing, more than 100,000 blocks for such pipes having been sold
during a single year.
Osage orange weighs 48.21 pounds per cubic foot. It is twenty-eight per
cent stronger than white oak, but is not quite as stiff, is very
brittle, and under heavy impact, will crumble. For that reason, Osage
wagon felloes will not stand rocky roads. The bark is sometimes used for
tanning, and the wood for dyeing.
RED MULBERRY (_Morus rubra_) is frequently spoken of simply as
mulberry, and is sometimes called black mulberry. The full grown
fruit is red, but turns black or very dark purple when ripe. The
berry is composed of a compact and adhering cluster of drupes, each
drupe about one thirty-second of an inch long. What seems to be a
single berry is really an aggregation of very small fruits, each
resembling a tiny cherry. The mulberry is naturally a forest tree,
but it is permitted to grow about the margins of fields, and is
often planted in door yards for its fruit and its shade. It is
looked upon by many as a tame species.
Two mulberries grow naturally in this country. The red species
ranges from Massachusetts west to Kansas, and south to Texas and
Florida. Its best growth is found in the lower Ohio valley and the
southern foot hills of the Appalachian mountains. The largest trees
are seventy feet high and three or four in diameter. If this tree
were abundant the wood’s place in furniture and finish would be
important. The heartwood is dark, of good figure, and fairly strong.
It takes a fine polish, and resembles black walnut, though usually
of a little lighter shade. Its largest use is as fence posts. It is
durable in contact with the soil. The effect when made into
furniture, finish, and various kinds of turnery, is pleasing. Farm
tools, particularly scythe snaths, are made of it, and it has been
reported for slack cooperage and boat building, but such uses are
apparently infrequent. The wood is evidently sold under some other
name, or without a name, for the total sawmill output in the United
States is given in government statistics at only 1,000 feet, which
is probably not one per cent of the cut.
MEXICAN MULBERRY (_Morus celtidifolia_) ranges from southern Texas
to Arizona. Trees are seldom more than thirty feet high and one in
diameter. The berry is about half an inch long, black, and made up
of a hundred or more very small drupes. It is edible, but its taste
is insipid. The wood is heavy and is of dark orange or dark brown
color. It is suitable for small turnery and other articles, but no
reports of uses for it have been found. The tree is occasionally
planted for its fruit by Mexicans, but Americans care little for it.
Two foreign mulberries have been extensively planted in this
country, and in some localities they are running wild and are
mistaken for native species. One is the white mulberry (_Morus
alba_), a native of China; the other is the paper mulberry
(_Broussonetia papyrifera_) a different genus, but of the same
family. It is a native of Japan, and has been naturalized in some of
the southern states. Nine varieties of the white mulberry have been
distinguished in cultivation.
[Illustration]
PERSIMMON
[Illustration: PERSIMMON]
PERSIMMON
(_Diospyros Virginiana_)
Persimmon belongs to the ebony family, and the family has contributed to
the civilization of the human race since very early times. Some of the
oldest furniture in existence, that which was found hidden in the ruins
of ancient Egypt, is ebony, and there is evidence among the old records
in the land of the Nile that the Egyptians made voyages southward
through the Red sea and brought back cargoes of ebony from Punt, a
region in eastern Africa. The name ebony is believed to be derived from
a Hebrew word, probably brought to Palestine by some of Solomon’s
captains who traded along the south coast of Asia or the east coast of
Africa about the time of the building of the first temple. The botanical
name for the genus (_diospyros_) is made up of two words meaning
“Jupiter’s wheat”--supposed to be a reference to the value of persimmons
as food. The name, however, is not as old as the Hebrew word, nor is the
Hebrew as old as the references to ebony in the records of Egypt. A
piece of the old furniture--not less than 4,000 years old--is still in
existence. It probably matches in age the cedar of Lebanon coffins in
the oldest Egyptian tombs.
The ebony family consists of five genera, one of which is persimmon
(_diospyros_). This genus consists of 160 species, only two of them in
the United States. Thus the persimmon trees of this country are a very
small part of the family to which they belong, but they are a highly
respectable part of it. The word persimmon is of Indian origin, and was
used by the tribes near the Atlantic coast. The original spelling was
“pessimin,” and that was probably about the pronunciation given it by
the aborigines.
It has never been called by many names. It is known as date plum in New
Jersey and Tennessee, and as possumwood in Florida. The avidity with
which opossums feed on the fruit is responsible for the name.
The range of persimmon extends from Connecticut to Florida, and westward
to Iowa, Missouri, and Texas. It reaches its largest size in the South.
It is of vigorous growth, spreading by means of seeds, and also by
roots. The latter is the most common method where the ground is open.
Such situations as old, abandoned fields invite the spread of
persimmons. Roots ramify under the ground, and sprouts spring up, often
producing thickets of an acre or more. Trees do not generally reach
large size if they grow in that way, but their crowded condition does
not make them fruitless as can be attested to by many a boy who
penetrates the persimmon thickets by means of devious paths that wind
with many a labyrinthic turn which takes in all that is worth finding.
The variation in the quality of persimmons is greater than that of most
wild fruits. Nature usually sets a standard and sticks closely to it,
but the rule is not adhered to in the case of persimmons. Some are twice
as large as others; some are never fit to eat, no matter how severely or
how often they are frosted; others require at least one fierce frost to
soften their austerity; but some may be eaten with relish without the
ameliorating influence of frost.
The austerity of a green persimmon is due to tannin. It is supposed that
cultivation might remove some of this objectionable quality, but no
great success has thus far attended efforts in that direction. Japanese
persimmons, which are of a different species, are cultivated with
success in California.
The sizes of persimmon trees vary according to soil, climate, and
situation. They average rather small, but occasionally reach a height of
100 feet and a diameter of nearly two. Mature trunks are usually little
over twelve inches in diameter, and many never reach that size.
The dry wood weighs 49.28 pounds per cubic foot, which is about the
weight of hickory. It is hard, strong, compact, and is susceptible of a
high polish. The yearly rings are marked by one or more bands of open
ducts, and scattered ducts occur in the rest of the wood. The medullary
rays are thin and inconspicuous; color of heartwood dark brown, often
nearly black; the sapwood is light brown, and frequently contains darker
spots.
The value of persimmon depends largely upon the proportion of sapwood to
heartwood. That was the case formerly more than it is now; for until
recent years the heartwood of persimmon was generally thrown away, and
the sapwood only was wanted; but demand for the heart has recently
increased. There is much difference in the proportion of heartwood to
sapwood in different trees. It does not seem to be a matter of size, nor
wholly of age. Small trunks sometimes have more heart than large ones. A
tree a hundred years old may have heartwood scarcely larger than a lead
pencil, and occasionally there is none. In other instances the heart is
comparatively large.
Persimmon has never been a wood of many uses, as hickory and oak have
been. In early times it was considered valuable almost wholly on account
of its fruit, and that had no commercial value, as it was seldom offered
for sale in the market. In the language of the southern negroes who
fully appreciated the fruit, it was “something good to run at”--meaning
that the ripe persimmons were gathered and eaten from the trees while
they lasted, but that few were preserved.
It is recorded that the “small wheel” of the pioneer cabins was
occasionally made of persimmon wood. The wheel so designated was the
machine on which wool and flax were spun by the people in their homes.
Spinning wheels were of two kinds, one large, with the operator walking
to and fro, the other small, with the operator sitting. It was the small
wheel which was sometimes made of persimmon. There is no apparent reason
why it should have been made of that wood in preference to any one of a
dozen others.
The demand for persimmon in a serious way began with its use as shuttles
in textile factories. Weavers had made shuttles of it for home use on
hand looms for many years before the demand came from power looms where
the shuttles were thrown to and fro by machinery. Up to some thirty
years ago, shuttles for factories were generally made of Turkish
boxwood, but the supply fell short and the advance in price caused a
search for substitutes. Two satisfactory shuttlewoods were found in this
country, persimmon and dogwood. The demand came not only from textile
mills in America but from those of Europe. The manufacture of shuttle
blocks became an industry of considerable importance.
Persimmon wood is suitable for shuttles because it wears smooth, is
hard, strong, tough, and of proper weight. Most woods that have been
tried for this article fail on account of splintering, splitting,
quickly wearing out, or wearing rough. The shuttle is not regarded as
satisfactory unless it stands 1,000 hours of actual work. Some woods
which are satisfactory for many other purposes will not last an hour as
a shuttle.
The manufacture of shuttles, after the square has been roughed out,
requires twenty-two operations. Probably more shuttlewood comes from
Arkansas than from any other section, though a dozen or more states
contribute persimmon. The total sawmill cut of this wood in the United
States is about 2,500,000 feet, but this does not include that which
never passes through a sawmill.
The wood has other uses. It has lately met demand from manufacturers of
golf heads. Skewers are made of it in North Carolina, and billiard cues
and mallets in Massachusetts.
The heartwood is dark and shuttle makers and golfhead manufacturers will
not have it. Until recently it was customary to throw it away, because
no sale for it could be found. It is now known to be suitable for
parquet flooring and for brush backs, and the demand for the heartwood
is as reliable as for the sapwood. A little of the dark wood is cut in
veneer and is employed in panel work, and other is used in turnery.
The seeds of persimmon furnished one of the early substitutes for coffee
in backwoods settlements when the genuine article could not be obtained.
They were parched and pounded until sufficiently pulverized. During the
Civil war many a confederate camp in the South was fragrant with the
aroma of persimmon seed coffee, after the soldiers had added the fruit
to their rations of cornbread.
MEXICAN PERSIMMON (_Diospyros texana_) grows in Texas and Mexico. It is
most abundant in southern and western Texas, where it suits itself to
different soils, is found on rich moist ground near the borders of
prairies, and also in rocky canyons and dry mesas. The largest trees are
fifty feet high and twenty inches in diameter, but trunks that large are
not abundant. The tree differs from the eastern persimmon in that the
sapwood is thinner, and the heartwood makes up a much greater proportion
of the trunk; the uses are consequently different, since it is taken for
its dark wood, the eastern tree for its light-colored sap. The fruit of
the Mexican persimmon is little esteemed. It is small, black, and the
thin layer of pulp between the skin and the seed is insipid. Until fully
ripe it is exceedingly austere. The Mexicans in the Rio Grande valley
make a dye of the persimmons and use it to color sheep skins. The
fruit’s supply of tannin probably contributes to the tanning as well as
the dyeing of the sheep pelts. The wood is heavier than eastern
persimmon, and has more than three fold more ashes in a cord of wood,
amounting to about 160 pounds. The bark is thin and the trunk gnarled.
The dark color of the wood gives it the name black persimmon in Texas.
Mexicans call it chapote. Sargent pronounces it the best American
substitute for boxwood for engraving purposes, but it does not appear to
be used outside of Texas. The wood is irregular in color, even in the
same piece, being variegated with lighter and darker streaks, and cloudy
effects. It ought to be fine brush-back material. It is worked into tool
handles, lodge furniture, canes, rules, pen holders, picture frames,
curtain rings, door knobs, parasol handles, and maul sticks for artists.
[Illustration]
FLOWERING DOGWOOD
[Illustration: FLOWERING DOGWOOD]
FLOWERING DOGWOOD
(_Cornus Florida_)
The dogwood or cornel family is old but not numerous. It originated
several hundred thousand years ago and spread over much of the world,
but preferred the temperate latitudes. One species at least crossed the
equator and established itself in the highlands of Peru. There are forty
or fifty species in all, about one-third of them in the United States,
but most are shrubs. Black gum and tupelo are members of the family, and
are giants compared with the dogwoods. In Europe the tree is usually
called cornel, and that has been made the family name. It is a very old
word, coined by the Romans before the days of Caesar. They so named it
because it was hard like horn (_cornus_ meaning horn in the Latin
language). They used it as shafts of spears, and so common was that use
that when a speaker referred to a spear he simply called it by the name
of the wood of the handle or shaft, as when Virgil described a combat
which was supposed to have occurred 800 years before the Christian era,
and used the words: “Clogged in the wound the Italian _cornel_ stood.”
The qualities of this wood which led to important uses among the Romans,
have always made dogwood a valuable material. Civilized nations do not
need it for spear shafts, but they have other demands which call for
large amounts.
The flowering dogwood has other names in this country. It is generally
known simply as dogwood, but it is called boxwood in Connecticut, Rhode
Island, New York, Mississippi, Michigan, Kentucky, and Indiana; false
box-dogwood in Kentucky; New England boxwood in Tennessee; flowering
cornel in Rhode Island; and cornel in Texas.
Its range extends from Massachusetts through Ontario and Michigan to
Missouri, south to Florida, and west to Texas. The area where it grows
includes about 800,000 square miles. It is most common and of largest
size in the South, comparatively rare in the North, generally occurs in
the shade of taller trees, and prefers well-drained soil, but is not
particular whether it is fertile or thin.
The dogwood is valuable as ornament and for its wood. It was formerly a
source of medicine, from roots, bark, and flowers; but it seems to have
been largely displaced by other drugs; was once considered a good
substitute for quinine, that use having been learned from Indian
doctors. The Indians dug roots for a scarlet dye with which the vain
warrior stained escutcheons on buckskin, and colored porcupine quills
and bald eagle feathers for decorating his moccasins and his hair.