Belaying pin

“ Considerable planting of pin oak has been done by railroads which expect to grow ties. Trees of this species when cut in forests and made into crossties do not all show similar resistance to decay. Some ties are perishable in a short time, while others give satisfactory service. The best endure well without preservative treatment, but all are benefited by it. If the experimental plantings turn out well, it may be expected that pin oak will fill an important place in the crosstie business. ”

“ If you bend the ends in removing the heads, hammer them out straight again; the pins must be perfectly straight. Very carefully work a pin, broken end first, up each leg well into the body. The dotted lines along the legs in Fig. 311 represent the pins placed inside; the points of the pins extend not less than an inch and a half below the feet B, B (Fig. 311) . C, C (Fig. 311) shows the raw cotton, which has not yet been packed into the feet. Lift the figure by the two pin points, and if it is firm and stiff finish stuffing the feet ”

“ Les essences qui ont donné les résultats les plus avantageux sont, parmi les résineux : le pin sylvestre, le pin noir d’Autriche, le pin de Corse et, parmi les feuillus : le peuplier baumier, le peuplier du Canada, le peuplier nivea ou argenté, le saule marçault, le saule à bois violet, l’aulne blanc et le bouleau blanc. ”

“ Pins are of various sizes, from the blanket-pin, three inches in length, to the smallest ribbon-pins, of which 300,000 only weigh one pound. Insect-pins, used by entomologists, are of finer wire than ordinary pins, and vary in length from three inches to a size smaller than ribbon-pins. It has been calculated that ten tons of pins are made every week in England alone, requiring from fourteen to fifteen tons of brass-wire.
"What becomes of all the pins?" a question every day asked, received an answer, a few years since, upon the opening of an old sewer for repair, in Rea-street, Birmingham. ”

“ A large proportion of the pins sold are stuck into paper by an automatic machine not less ingenious than the pin making machine itself. Mourning pins are made of iron wire, finished by immersing in black japan and drying in a stove. A considerable variety of pins, including the ingeniously coiled, bent and twisted nursery safety pin, ladies' hairpins, &c, are also made by automatic machinery. ”

“ This will be understood by inspecting Fig. 107, where A A' shows a lever fork as if in contact with both banks, and the jewel pin, represented at B B'', just passes the angle a c' of the fork. The circle described by the jewel pin B is indicated by the arc e. It is well to put a slight friction under the balance rim, in order that we can try the freedom of the guard pin. As a rule, all the guard pin needs is to be free and not touch the roller. The entire point, as far as setting the fork and bankings is concerned, is to have the fork and roller action sound. ”

“ True, it leans neither to left nor right, its trunk is seldom contorted; if it grow at all it must grow straight toward the zenith; but it is sadly maimed, nevertheless,—hardly more than a tall stick with a broom at the top. If you would see a typical white pine you must go elsewhere to look for it. I remember one such, standing by itself in a broad Concord River meadow; not remarkable for its size, but of a symmetry and beauty that make the traveler turn again and again, till he is a mile away, to gaze upon it. No pine-tree ever grew like that in a wood. ”

“ Common pine will not do; for although, when well seasoned, it is light enough, it is rarely strong enough to bear the required strain. The tree known to Norwegians as the fir (Sylvestris pinus) , which has long, flexible needles, hanging in tassels (not evenly distributed along the branch, as in the spruce) , is most commonly used, as it is tough and pitchy, but becomes light in weight, without losing its strength, when it is well seasoned and dried. Any other strong and straight-grained wood might, perhaps, be used, but would, I think, be liable to the objection of being too heavy. ”

“ First-quality pine costs more than any other soft wood used for joinery.
American Red Pine.—This is the wood of the Pinus mitis, which is called in America the yellow pine, and is very like the wood of the Scotch fir, though it does not equal it in strength or durability, neither does it grow so large as the Dantzic and Memel timber. Being very straight-grained and free from knots, it is valuable for joiners' work, when a stronger wood than yellow pine (described in the previous paragraph) is required. It is more expensive than Baltic fir, consequently is not so largely used in England. ”

“ The nut-pine, Pinus edulis, scattered along the upper slopes and roofs of the cañon buildings, is the principal tree of the strange Dwarf Cocanini Forest. It is a picturesque stub of a pine about twenty-five feet high, usually-with dead, lichened limbs thrust through its rounded head, and grows on crags and fissured rock tables, braving heat and frost, snow and drought, and continues patiently, faithfully fruitful for centuries. Indians and insects and almost every desert bird and beast come to it to be fed. ”

“ Indeed the last half-century has seen the good white pine of the world pretty nearly used up, certainly all the best of it, for woodworking purposes. Fifty years ago it was the cheapest New England wood, today it is the highest-priced, and the old-time clear pine, free from knots and sapwood is almost impossible to obtain at any price. For all the forestry we can bring into play it will take more than three centuries to grow for us such trees as were common in Maine and New Hampshire a century ago. In 1832 white pines were not rare in Maine six feet in diameter and 240 feet high. ”

“ Even as decades pass its limbs still remain numerous and though there is abundant wood in the half century old pasture pine it is of little use for lumber, for the limbs, young and old, have filled its trunk with knots. Where our present day trees have seeded in thickly and uniformly over considerable space it is different. Then as the trees grow old they grow taller, each struggling to outdo its neighbors and get more light and air. Lower limbs decay in time and in the progress of forty or fifty years we get a "second growth" pine which is fairly limbless for a height of forty or fifty feet. ”

“ In deep and damp old woods it is slower of growth; it is then almost without sap-wood and has a yellowish color like the flesh of the pumpkin. For this reason it is called 'pumpkin-pine.' The bark of young trees of the white-pine species is very smooth and of a reddish, bottle-green color. It is covered in summer with a pearly gloss. On old trunks the bark is less rough than that of any other pine. This tree has the spreading habit of the cedar of Lebanon. ”

“ This splendid pine has run the gamut of uses from the corral pole of the first settler to the paneled door turned out by the modern factory. It has almost an unlimited capacity for usefulness. It grows in dry regions of the Rocky Mountains where it is practically the only source of wood supply; and it is equally secure in its position where forests are abundant and fine. It has supplied props, stulls, and lagging for mines in nearly every state touched by its range. ”

“ Ray-tracheids with dentate walls and ray-cells with large pits are peculiar to Pinus. Therefore the presence of these characters, alone or in combination, is sufficient evidence for the recognition of Pine-wood. But the combination of smooth tracheids with small pits (subsection Paracembra) Pinus shares with Picea, Larix and Pseudotsuga.
Among Hard Pines the size of the pits has a certain geographical significance. The large pits are found in all species of the Old World except P. halepensis and P. pinaster; the small pits in all species of the New World except P. resinosa and P. tropicalis. ”

“ A few pieces of fat pine were a great treasure. It is interesting to remember how much of this food for fire is still concealed in the bowels of the earth. In previous years I had often gone “prospecting” over some bare hill-side, where a pitch-pine wood had formerly stood, and got out the fat pine roots. They are almost indestructible. Stumps thirty or forty years old, at least, will still be sound at the core, though the sapwood has all become vegetable mould, as appears by the scales of the thick bark forming a ring level with the earth four or five inches distant from the heart. ”

“ It is heavy and very strong. It makes fine lumber, ties, fuel, fencing and furniture. It is used in shipbuilding and for other things when a durable wood is needed. It is rich in turpentine, resin and tar. Indeed, the markets of Europe are supplied with those articles largely by the Scotch pine and those of the United States, chiefly by the Georgia pine. Because of the length of the southern pine’s needles, which sometimes measure more than a foot, it is sometimes called the long-leaved pine. The leaves grow in threes. Its large cone also contains seeds, which are eaten. ”

“ The best kindling is fat pine or the bark of the paper birch. Fat pine is found in the stumps and butt cuts of pine trees, particularly those that died on the stump. The resin has collected there and dried. This wood is usually easy to split. Pine knots are the tough, heavy resinous stubs of limbs that are found on dead pine trees. They, as well as fat pine, are almost imperishable, and those sticking out of old rotten logs are as good as any. In collecting pine knots go to fallen trees that are almost rotted away. Hit the knot a lick with the pole of the axe and generally it will yield ”

“ The spruce (Abies Smithiana, "Seh") has also white wood, which is employed for posts and beams.* [These woods are all soft and loose in grain, compared with their European allies.] These are the only pines whose woods are considered very useful; and it is a curious circumstance that none produce any quantity of resin, turpentine, or pitch; which may perhaps be accounted for by the humidity of the climate.
Pinus longifolia (called by the Lepchas "Gniet-koong," and by the Bhoteeas "Teadong") only grows in low valleys, where better timber is abundant. ”

“ Aside from the beauty of most pines and the majesty of some of them, their utility is not confined to nuts alone. Timber and sap products are very valuable. The sugar pine in the latitude of New York is hardy, but does not grow as rapidly as it does in the West. The same may be said of the Jeffrey bull pine, but I shall show you some thriftier trees of this latter species tomorrow on my property. A very pretty striped nut is that of the Pinus pinea. ”

“ The largest measurements I have ever seen give to one a diameter of two and a half feet, and ninety feet height; to another a girth of seven feet at the ground, and eighty feet height. This Pine is chiefly valued for the excellence of its fuel; and for generating steam in working engines it is preferable to any other wood. [6] Formerly, in some parts of the country, it was found much larger than it now is. "Men are living in Massachusetts and Maine who remember that it was not uncommon to find them of more than a hundred feet in height and four or five feet in diameter." ”

“ The cones are small and have a tendency to remain attached to the tree, sometimes for many years. These cones may break open during a forest fire and scatter the seeds in all directions. In central Oregon and on the cast slopes of the Cascade Range there are in many places dense thickets of small lodgepole pine. This tree is not yet of great commercial importance but experiments are being made to develop new uses for its wood.
Pine, Linn County. Pine post office was situated atout ten miles east-southeast of Harrisburg near the Lane County line. ”

“ In its eyes everything is both good and bad; and for my own part, I sometimes wonder whether this may not be the sum of all wisdom,—to find everything good in its place, and everything bad out of its place.
Thoughts like these suggest themselves as I look at the pitch-pine, which, to speak only of such trees as grow within the range of my own observation, is the one irregular member of the family of cone-bearers. The white or Weymouth pine, the hemlock, the cedars, the spruces, the fir, and the larch, these are all, in different ways, of a decidedly symmetrical turn. ”

“ They are used as a dessert nut chiefly, but form an important food supply in some parts of Europe. The Swiss stone pine, Pinus cembra, is one of the hardy nut pines, fruitful in this vicinity, and the Pinus Armandi, the Korean pine and the Lace-bark pine from central China, are hardy and fruitful in this vicinity, to our knowledge. ”

“ Pinus sylvestris is therefore our only Pine, yet people persist in calling it a Fir, a name more especially belonging to the genus Abies. Time was when this beautiful tree grew wild in many parts of Britain; it is now found naturally in but a few places, from Yorkshire northwards; otherwhere it has been planted. We may easily tell whether a cone-bearing tree before us is a Pine or not by examining the leaf-cluster. If the leaves are in twos, threes, or fives, bound together at the base by thin, chaffy scales, it is a Pine. Should they be in twos, the leaves will be found to be half-rounded ”

“ Babcock walked swiftly out toward the Wauchung bridge. It was a crisp, invigorating breeze, with the strength of the lake in it, and a faint odour of pine. Men grow rugged and hardy in this region, whether they follow blaze-marks or mariner's compass. No malaria oozes from the dry white sand; the children rather draw from it the sap that makes the pine tree tall and sound. ”