It will be remembered that it was knowledge of the special values of different woods that made "the one horse shay," "The Deacon's Masterpiece." "So the Deacon inquired of the village folk Where he could find the strongest oak, That couldn't be split nor bent nor broke,-- That was for spokes and floor and sills; He sent for lancewood to make the thills; The cross bars were ash, from the straightest trees, The panels of whitewood, that cuts like cheese, But lasts like iron for things like these. The hubs of logs from the "Settler's Ellum,"-- Last of its timber,--they couldn't sell 'em. Never an ax had seen their chips, And the wedges flew from between their lips, Their blunt ends frizzled like celery tips; Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw, Spring, tire, axle and linch pin too, Steel of the finest, bright and blue; Thorough brace, bison skin, thick and wide; Boot, top dasher from tough old hide, Found in the pit when the tanner died. That was the way to "put her through." 'There!' said the Deacon, 'naow she'll dew!'" [Footnote 1: Hygroscopicity, "the property possessed by vegetable tissues of absorbing or discharging moisture and expanding or shrinking accordingly."--_Century Dictionary._] [Footnote 2: This is shown by the following table, from Forestry Bulletin No. 10, p. 31, _Timber_, by Filibert Roth: POUNDS OF WATER LOST IN DRYING 100 POUNDS OF GREEN WOOD IN THE KILN. Sap-wood or Heart-wood outer part. or interior. 1. Pines, cedars, spruces, and firs 45-65 16-25 2. Cypress, extremely variable 50-65 18-60 3. Poplar, cottonwood, basswood 60-65 40-60 4. Oak, beech, ash, elm, maple, birch, hickory, chestnut, walnut, and sycamore 40-50 30-40 ] [Footnote 3: The following table from Roth, p. 37, gives the approximate shrinkage of a board, or set of boards, 100 inches wide, drying in the open air: Shrinkage Inches. 1. All light conifers (soft pine, spruce, cedar, cypress) 3 2. Heavy conifers (hard pine, tamarack, yew, honey locust, box elder, wood of old oaks) 4 3. Ash, elm, walnut, poplar, maple, beech, sycamore, cherry, black locust 5 4. Basswood, birch, chestnut, horse chestnut, blue beech, young locust 6 5. Hickory, young oak, especially red oak Up to 10 The figures are the average of radial and tangential shrinkages.]