Costly Woods | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 6, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 42.

Costly Woods.

THE finest and most costly of the veneer woods, says the Lumber World, is French walnut—a wood that does not come from France, but from Persia and Asia Minor. The tree is crooked and dwarfed, and is solely valuable for the burls that can be obtained from it. These are large, tough excrescences, growing upon the trunk. In this the grain is twisted into the most singular and complicated figures. The intricacy of these figures, combined with their symmetry, is one of the elements that determine the values of the burl. Color and soundness are other elements of value, which vary very widely. Burls worth from $500 to $1,000 each are not rare, and at the Paris Exposition for 1878 one burl weighing 2,200 pounds was sold for $5,000, or upwards of $2.00 a pound.

In buying burls much care is necessary to guard against fraud. Often decay and malformation result in leaving hollows in the very center, which of course greatly lessen the value. These hollow places are sometimes filled by fraudulent dealers with substances resembling the wood, and the whole is sold at a very much higher price than it is worth. Compressed manure is one of the materials used for this purpose. An even worse fraud than this is that of placing stones in the hollows to increase the weight, and thereby enhance the value of the burl. This not only cheats the buyer, but is liable to ruin the valuable knives used in cutting the veneers. There are rosewood and mahogany burls, but, unlike those of the French walnut, they are of little or no value. In those woods it is the trunk of the tree that is prized; the knots are discarded.

Next to French walnut, ebony is probably the most valuable of the cabinet woods. Occasionally a fine piece is found that brings even a better price than the French walnut. For a particularly large piece, even five dollars a pound might be paid. In ebony the main thing is size. It is difficult to get large pieces that can be used without cutting.

Rosewood and mahogany are always in demand. The best mahogany is that of San Domingo. Next come the mahoganies of Cuba, Honduras, Mexico, and Africa. There is much less difference in value between different mahoganies and rosewoods than between different specimens of ebony and French walnut. Fair rosewood will sell in the log for five and a half to seven cents per pound.—Presbyterian Banner.