The wood is moderately light, and is strong and stiff. It is probably the hardest of the cedars, and the grain is so regular that high polish is possible. Under favorable circumstances trees grow with fair rapidity, but when conditions are unfavorable, as on high mountains where summers are short and winters severe, growth is remarkably slow, and twenty years or more may be required for one inch increase in trunk diameter. The wood of such trees is hard, dense, and strong. The grain of yellow cedar is usually straight. The bands of summerwood are narrow, the annual rings are indistinct, and an attempt to count them is often attended with considerable difficulty. The wood is easily worked, satiny, susceptible of a beautiful polish, and possesses an agreeable resinous odor. The heartwood is bright, clear yellow, and the thin sapwood is a little lighter in color. In common with all other cedars, yellow cedar resists decay many years. Logs which have lain in damp woods half a century remain sound inside the sapwood. Sometimes fallen timber in that region is quickly buried under deep beds of moss which preserves it from decay much longer than if the logs lie exposed to alternate dampness and dryness. Statistics of sawmill operations in the Northwest do not distinguish between the different cedars, and the cut of yellow cedar is unknown. It is considerable, but of course not to be compared with the more abundant western red cedar. Statistics of uses are as meager as of the lumber output. In Washington the factories which use wood as raw material report only 7,500 feet of yellow cedar a year. Doubtless much more than that is used, but under other names. There is no occasion to disguise this wood under other names. It has a striking individuality and deserves a place of its own. In some respects it is one of the best woods of the Pacific Northwest. In nearly every situation where it has been tried, it has been found satisfactory. Its rich yellow presents a fine appearance in furniture and interior finish, and the polish which it takes surpasses that possible with any other cedar, with the probable exception of some of the scarce, high mountain junipers. It has been used for pyrography and patterns, two hard places to fill, and for which few woods are suitable. Indians long ago in Alaska learned that it was the best material for boat paddles which their forests afforded. It possesses the requisite stiffness and strength, and it wears to a smoothness almost like ebony. Boat factories have many uses for the wood, decking, railing, and interior finish being among the most important. It is said to be a satisfactory substitute for Spanish cedar in the manufacture of cigar boxes, but its use for that purpose is not yet large. It is said that occasional exports of this wood go to China where it is finished in imitation of scarce and expensive woods of that country.