ees to grow in Lebanon; and if so, methinks it
should rather be (as Buxtorf thinks) a kind of cedar; (yet we find fir
also in the same period) for we have seen a whiter sort of it, even very
white as well as red; though some affirm it to be but the sap of it (so
our cabinet-makers call it) I say, there were both fir and pine-trees
also growing upon those mountains, and the learned Meibomius, (in that
curious treatise of his _De Fabrica Triremium_) shews that there were
such trees brought out of India, or Ophir. In the mean time, Mr. Purchas
informs us, that Dr. Dee writ a laborious treatise almost wholly of this
subject, (but I could never have the good hap to see it) wherein, as
commissioner for Solomon's timber, and like a learned architect and
planter, he has summon'd a jury of twelve sorts of trees; namely, 1. the
fir, 2. box, 3. cedar, 4. cypress, 5. ebony, 6. ash, 7. juniper, 8.
larch, 9. olive, 10. pine, 11. oak, and 12. sandal-trees, to examine
which of them were this _almugim_, and at last seems to concur with
Josephus, in favour of pine or fir; who possibly, from some antient
record, or fragment of the wood it self, might learn something of it;
and 'tis believ'd, that it was some material both odoriferous to the
scent, and beautiful to the eye, and of fittest temper to refract
sounds; besides its serviceableness for building; all which properties
are in the best sort of pine or _thyina_, as Pliny calls it; or perhaps
some other rare wood, of which the Eastern Indies are doubtless the best
provided; and yet I find, that those vast beams which sustain'd the roof
of St. Peter's church at Rome, laid (as reported) by Constantine the
Great, were made of the pitch-tree, and have lasted from _anno_ 336,
down to our days, above 1300 years.

13. But now whilst I am reciting the uses of these beneficial
trees,{245:1} Mr. Winthorp presents the Royal Society with the process
of making the tar and pitch in New-England, which we thus abbreviate.
Tar is made out of that sort of pine-tree, from which naturally
turpentine extilleth; and which at its first flowing out, is liquid and
clear; but being hardned by the air, either on the tree, or where-ever
it falls, is not much unlike the Burgundy pitch; and we call them
pitch-pines out of which this gummy substance transudes: They grow upon
the most barren plains, on rocks also, and hills rising amongst those
plains, where several are found blown down, and have lain so many ages,
a