Page:Willich, A. F. M. - The Domestic Encyclopædia (Vol. 3, 1802).djvu/299

Rh Although we cannot enter into farther details, relative to this method of promoting the growth of compass-timber, yet we trust the plan is sufficiently obvious and practicable, to be generally adopted: the curious reader is therefore referred to the 13th vol. of the Transactions of the patriotic Society above mentioned.

The saw-dust, and even the leaves, though inferior to the bark, have been found useful in tanning. It appears, from numerous experiments made by the Rev. Mr., of Puckle-church, near Bristol, and recorded in the 10th vol. of the Transactions of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, &c. that half a peck of oak-leaves contains nearly as much astringent matter as one pound of bark.—Farther, the leaves make excellent hot-beds, and the saw-dust is the principal indigenous vegetable used in this country, for tinging fustians of various brown colours.

The, or excrescences, produced on the leaves, are employed for dyeing, and various other purposes, already stated in p. 355, of our 2d volume.— The balls, or apples, growing on this tree, are sometimes substituted for the galls, in dyeing black colours, with the addition of copperas; but these shades, though more beautiful, are by no means of equal durability to those obtained from the former.—Lastly, the juice, expressed from oak-apples, when mixed with vitriol and gum arabic, will niakc an excellent black ink.

With respect to the medicinal properties of the oak, its bark is a powerful astringent, whence it has often been used with advantage in hæmorrhages, alvine fluxes, and other immoderate secretions.

Beside the common oak, so generally known and cultivated, there is an exotic species, which has lately been recommended to public attention by Mr., in the 5th vol. of the Memoirs of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester. This species is there called the Iron, Wainscot, or Turkey Oak, and is stated to be a non-descript variety of the Quercus Cerris, or smaller prickly-cupped Spanish Oak, or that which Mr. (in his Hortus Kewensis), terms the frondosa.—The Iron Oak grows to a considerable height, producing a bulky trunk, and widely spreading head, with large oblong-oval, deeply-serrated leaves, and acorns of an unusual size, in capacious prickly cups:—from these circumstances, we believe it rather to be the species denominated Ægilops, or Large Prickly-cupped Spanish Oak; which grows not only in Spain, but also in Turkey (whence the Iron kind was originally brought to England), and corresponds in every other respect to the Iron or Wainscot Oak.

This valuable species is propagated in a similar manner with the common British Oak, which it fully equals in hardness, and weight, while it excels in growth or size, as will appear from the following comparative statement:

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