gene- proved equal to the strains brought to bear upon it; the stays, shrouds, and other rigging being quite sufficient to hold it against any ordinary amount of pressure.[1]
After the spars have been withdrawn from each season's fall of trees, the remainder are hewn into a square form, producing logs varying from 14 to 26 inches square, and from 18 to 40 feet in length (Fig. 29). These pass through a sorting for quality, to suit the market, but there are no official brands by which the surveyor could at once identify them. Good, sound, practical judgment is therefore most essential for making a selection of this wood.
FIG. 29.
Occasionally we see quoted some "waney" timber for board purposes, or "waney board timber." These logs are not so perfectly hewn or squared as the ordinary timber, and are usually short butts of trees, which are very clean in the grain, free from knots, and solid at the centre. These are probably procured from fine trees that
- ↑ Masts made of Yellow Pine can seldom be relied upon after eight or ten years' work, especially if they have been used in the tropics, where the intense heat and rains deteriorate them very rapidly. Every care should therefore be taken to preserve them, first by painting them only after thorough seasoning, and then at intervals of a year or so. The covers at the wedging decks should also be carefully looked to, and kept in good condition, to prevent damp from affecting the mast at that part. The introduction of iron for the lower masts of ships is now fast superseding the use of wood, both in the royal and the mercantile navy.
