Wood grain

“ While wood of fairly close grain does not necessarily indicate inferiority, if the material is hickory, yet if ash is selected, the purchaser should select an open, or widely spaced, grain in preference to a close and even-grained plank. ”

“ Plain maple is never grained in oil as it would be too tedious to imitate it by wiping. Therefore its graining by distemper work is the only method worth the while to describe. To be able to grain it well the student must have its character well made out—in his head at least. The color if the wood is grained in its natural color is made from raw sienna weakened down to suit by the addition of whiting. The character of the wood is best produced by the application of the color with a sponge. ”

“ In scarcely any other wood-using industry—probably excepting the making of handles—is the grain so closely watched. Hickory users generally speak of the annual growth rings as the grain. The grain must run straight in spokes, rims, shafts, and poles. If the grain crosses the stick, a break may occur by the simple process of splitting, and the hickory in that case is no more dependable than many other woods. ”

“ The structure of wood is porous, hence its lightness, it has also a grain which runs the whole length of the wood in circles round its centre to the surface, one of these circles is produced every year while the tree is growing; wood is therefore capable of being cleft in the direction of the grain by a wedge, in this way builder’s laths are made. Wood cannot be cleft across the grain, but must be cut by sawing or otherwise. The pine or fir tribe produce the largest and straightest timber, but it is not so strong nor so durable as oak and many other woods. ”

“ All wood when undergoing a seasoning process, either natural (by air) or mechanical (by steam or heat in a dry kiln) , checks or splits more or less. This is due to the uneven drying-out of the wood and the consequent strains exerted in opposite directions by the wood fibres in shrinking. This shrinkage, it has been proven, takes place both end-wise and across the grain of the wood. The old tradition that wood does not shrink end-wise has long since been shattered, and it has long been demonstrated that there is an end-wise shrinkage. ”

“ After seven years of investigation the author has worked out the following theory of the strength of wheat flours, which has finally enabled him to devise a method which promises to be both accurate and rapid, and to require so little flour that it can readily be used by the wheat breeder to determine the strength of the grain in a single ear. It has already been mentioned that a strong wheat is one that will make a large loaf of good shape and texture. The strength of a wheat may therefore be defined as the power of making a large loaf of good shape and texture. ”

“ The stumps are left to rot in the ground, and the corn is sown among them. Grass land is cleared in a different manner. The grass in that country is enormously thick and long. The cultivator gathers a bundle into his hands, twists the ends together, and ties them in a knot. He then cuts the roots with his adze-like hoe, so as to leave the bunch of grass still standing, like a sheaf of wheat. When a field has been entirely cut, it looks to a stranger as if it were in harvest, the bundles of grass standing at intervals like the grain shocks. ”

“ The external appearance of the wood is of fine grain and smooth, close texture, but when broken the lines of fracture do not run with apparent direction of the growth; possibly it is this unevenness of grain which renders the wood so difficult to dry without twisting and warping. It has little resiliency; can be easily bent when steamed, and when properly dried will hold its shape. The annual rings are not distinctly marked, medullary rays fine and numerous. The green wood contains much water, and consequently is heavy and difficult to float, but when dry it is as light as basswood. ”

“ In imitating quartered oak, or any other wood, it should always be borne in mind that it is the wood that we wish to imitate, and not somebody's idea of what it should be—for if we copy others, we become, as Byron says, "degenerate copyists of copies"—and the best thing that any beginner can do is to procure pieces of the real wood, study the various changes of grain and get the general character of the grains of each wood impressed upon his mind, then endeavor to reproduce them in his work ”

“ They lie between the wedge-like blocks of wood, and as they have a lighter colour than the wood, they are evident on an oblique section [7] of any stem, and are called the silver grain. Their colour and number suffice to enable anyone to distinguish various kinds of wood, and greatly increase their beauty. They cannot, of course, exist before the wood is formed, and are therefore not met with in very young trees. They commence to exist with the first deposited layers of wood, and continue to grow outwardly, or nearest to the bark, so long as the wood continues to be deposited. ”

“ The women, in the beginning of summer, after having burnt the stubble of the preceding crop, rudely stir the ground with a long crooked piece of wood; they then throw in grain, which is chiefly the coarse but productive species of maize peculiar to the continent. ”

“ Sometimes a pole is stuck into the earth, and the corn is bound round it at some distance from the ground, so that it resembles an angler’s float of gigantic dimensions. The oddest, though perhaps the safest, way of packing grain, is to tie it up in a bundle, and hang it to the branch of a tree. When wanted for use, it is pounded in a wooden mortar like those of the Ovambo tribe, in order to beat off the husk, and finally it is ground between two stones. ”

“ Some people think that successfully to imitate the color [Pg 47] and the grain of any wood or any marble is as much of an art as is the representation of a landscape, for, while there are dozens of artists who can faithfully reproduce a landscape on canvas, there are few who can make a pine door look like the oak or cherry jamb and casing that surround it, as first-class grainers often have to do, and do so well that not one person in a thousand could tell the real wood from the imitation. ”

“ The Dôr surpass the Djour in industry, a proof of which existed in their extensive fields and granaries. Prior to the rainy season, their grain was threshed and preserved in large cylindrical receptacles, constructed of reeds and clay, from twelve to fifteen feet in diameter, and four feet in height, supported upon a strong wood framework some four feet from the ground. ”

“ Mr Prout’s system was to cultivate the land by steam power, to manure on the lines suggested by the Rothamsted experiments, and to sell both grain and straw. Wheat was grown continuously year after year until the soil became infested with weeds, when 8 some kind of root crop was grown to give an opportunity to clean the land. A root crop is not sown until June so that the land is bare for cleaning all the spring and early summer. ”

“ There can be no doubt of the fact, that the particular species of grain-bearing grass mentioned above is intentionally planted. In farmer-like manner the ground upon which it stands is carefully 620 divested of all other grasses and weeds during the time it is growing. When it is ripe the grain is taken care of, the dry stubble cut away and carried off, the paved area being left unencumbered until the ensuing autumn, when the same 'ant-rice' reappears within the same circle, and receives the same agricultural attention as was bestowed upon the previous crop ”

“ Wood in its quality and uses like white cedar. Thick, red heartwood, changing to reddish brown when seasoned. Thin sapwood, nearly white, coarse, straight grain, compact structure. Light, not strong, soft, very durable in contact with the soil, not resinous, easily worked, does not burn easily, receives high polish. Used for timber, shingles, flumes, fence posts, coffins, railway ties, water pipes, interior decorations, and cabinetmaking. A very large tree, limited to the coast ranges of California, and forming considerable forests, which are rapidly being converted into lumber. ”

“ It is found over the same range as white oak, and is more plentiful. Wood is spongy in grain, moderately durable, but unfit for work requiring strength. Used for agricultural implements, furniture, bob sleds, vehicle parts, boxes, cooperage, woodenware, fixtures, interior finish, railway ties, etc., etc. Common in all parts of its range. Maine to Minnesota, and southward to the Gulf. ”

“ Heartwood is light brown in color, often nearly white; sapwood hardly distinguishable, fine grain, fibres interwoven. Wood is heavy, not hard, difficult to work, strong, very tough, checks and warps considerably in drying, not durable. It is distributed from Maine to southern Ontario, through central Michigan to southeastern Missouri, southward to the valley of the Brazos River in Texas, and eastward to the Kissimmee River and Tampa Bay in Florida. ”

“ THE following remarks, while not claiming to be anything new or startling, will perhaps be of interest to those who seek to improve themselves in the modern style of imitating the grain of wood. The ideas set forth in these pages are founded on the observation and every-day experience of a grainer to the trade who does not claim to be the best in the world, but who offers his suggestions for the good of the craft. ”

“ This room, each of whose sides was lined with mirrors that echoed each other all along the walls, reflecting, as far as the eye could reach, whole series of rose boudoirs, had been celebrated among the women who loved to immerse their nudity in this bath of warm carnation, made fragrant with the odor of mint emanating from the exotic wood of the furniture. ”

“ They'd rather fight than ate, but rather wark than fight."
The big, light ship, even with upper canvas gone and the yards braced to port, was skimming along over the heaving seas at a ten-knot rate, and Murphy's occasional glimpses of that growing landfall showed him details of rock and wood and red sandy soil that bespoke a steep beach and a rocky bottom. The air was full of spume and the gale whistled dismally through the rigging with a sound very much like that of Murphy's big base-burner in his Front Street boarding-house, when the chill wintry winds whistled over the housetops. ”

“ Wood in its quality similar to the preceding. The fruit of this species is gathered in large quantities and used in the manufacture of gin; whose peculiar flavor and medicinal properties are due to the oil of Juniper berries, which is secured by adding the crushed fruit to undistilled grain spirit, or by allowing the vapor to pass over it before condensation. Used locally for construction purposes, fence posts, etc. Ranges from Greenland to Alaska, in the East, southward to Pennsylvania and northern Nebraska; in the Rocky Mountains to Texas, Mexico, and Arizona. ”

“ For instance, in picking out the plants possessing strong grain from cultures of the second generation after making his crosses, the plant breeder up to the present has had to rely on inspection by eye, and on the separation of gluten by chewing, for a single plant obviously cannot yield enough grain to mill and bake. This fact no doubt explains the differences of opinion among plant breeders on the inheritance of strength, for it is not every one who can acquire the power of judging wheat accurately by his senses. ”

“ He left the vestibule and stretched out on his bed to rest, but, absorbed by this new fancy of his, his mind, even in his sleep, could not lessen its tension and he was soon wandering among the gloomy insanities of a nightmare.
He found himself in the center of a walk, in the heart of the wood; twilight had fallen. He was strolling by the side of a woman whom he had never seen before. She was emaciated and had flaxen hair, a bulldog face, freckles on her cheeks, crooked teeth projecting under a flat nose. She wore a nurse's white apron, a long neckerchief, torn in strips on her bosom ”

“ Most big craft are built of oak or hard pine, and fastened together with iron spikes and bolts—sixty tons at least to a three-hundred-ton schooner. After a year or two this hard, heavy wood becomes water-soaked, and, with the iron bolts and spikes, is heavier than water, and will sink when the hold is flooded.
"This craft of ours was like a small boat—built of soft light wood, with trunnels instead of bolts, and no iron on board except the anchors and one capstan. ”

“ The wood is deliciously fragrant, and fine in grain and texture; it is of a rich cream-yellow, as if formed of condensed sunbeams. ”

“ But the discovery that Red Fife would produce strong wheat in England by no means solved the problem, for when the Home Grown Wheat Committee distributed seed of their pure strain of that variety for extended testing throughout the country, it was soon found to be only a poor yielder except in a few districts. A yield of three quarters of strong grain, even if it makes 40s. per quarter on the market, only gives to the farmer a return of £6 per acre, as compared with a return of nearly £8 from 41⁄2 quarters of weak grain worth 35s. ”

“ The simple two-handled plough is being dragged by a pair of cows, who have the yoke fastened across the horns instead of lying on the neck, and a sower is following behind, scattering the grain out of a basket into the newly-made furrows. In front of the cows is a young calf, which has run to meet its mother, and is leaping for joy before her as she steadily plods along her course. ”

“ A calcareous clay-loam may be regarded as the best soil for wheat. And when it does not exist in a natural state, all the additions in the form of manure should be with reference to the formation of such a soil. If the land be light and sandy, clay, and marl, and wood ashes should be added, together with barnyard manure; if the soil is a tenacious clay, it should be warmed and mellowed by sand and manure; if it is deficient in lime, lime in substance, or in marl must be given; vegetable molds, if heavily dressed with wood-ashes and lime, may be brought to produce wheat. ”