Domestic Encyclopædia (1802)/Deal

DEAL, a well-known wood, bring the production of the fir-tree, and of great utility for building, and other purposes.

An excellent method of seasoning planks of deal and fir is, to immerse them into salt-water, as soon as they are sawed, for three or four days; care being taken to turn them frequently during that time. They should then be exposed to the sun and air, which will in a considerable degree harden them, though it will not prevent them from shrinking.—See Timber.

By the stat. of 13 and 14 Car. II. c. 2; and 6 Geo. I. c. 15, no deal-boards or fir-timber may be imported from the Netherlands; but fir-timber, fir-planks, and deal-boards, the growth of Germany, are importable from any place in that country, by British subjects only, in British-built ships, legally navigated. By 39 Geo. III. c. 3, deal-boards, fir, and timber, may be imported in British-built ships, owned and navigated according to law, from Hamburgh, Bremen, Altona, and Gluckstadt, until the 1st of August, 1802.—See Fir-tree.