supposed superior
quality of wood cut in winter, and the early practice in England of
felling oak timber at that season, may be inferred from a statute of
James I., which enacted "that no person or persons shall fell, or cause
to be felled, any oaken trees meet to be barked, when bark is worth 2s.
a cart-load (timber for the needful building and reparation of houses,
ships or mills only excepted), but between the first day of April and
last day of June, not even for the king's use, out of barking time,
except for building or repairing his Majesty's houses or ships." In
giving testimony before a committee of the House of Commons in March
1771, Mr Barnard of Deptford expressed it as his opinion that to secure
durable timber for shipbuilding, trees should be barked in spring and
not felled till the succeeding winter. In France, so long ago as 1669, a
royal decree limited the felling of timber from the 1st of October to
the 15th of April; and, in an order issued to the commissioners of
forests, Napoleon I. directed that the felling of naval timber should
take place only from November 1 to March 15, and during the decrease of
the moon, on account of the rapid decay of timber, through the
fermentation of its sap, if cut at other seasons. The burying of wood in
water, which dissolves out or alters its putrescible constituents, has
long been practised as a means of seasoning. The old "Resistance"
frigate, which went down in Malta harbour, remained under water for some
months, and on being raised was found to be entirely freed from the dry
rot fungus that had previously covered her; similarly, in the ship
"Eden," the progress of rot was completely arrested by 18 months'
submergence in Plymouth Sound, so that after remaining a year at home in
excellent condition she was sent out to the East Indies. It was an
ancient practice in England to place timber for thrashing-floors and oak
planks for wainscotting in running water to season them. Whale and other
oils have been recommended for the preservation of wood; and in 1737 a
patent for the employment of hot oil was taken out by a Mr Emerson.

For the modern processes of preserving timber see TIMBER.

DUALISM (from rare Lat. _dualis_, containing two, from _duo_), a
philosophical term applied to all theories which attempt to explain
facts by reference to two coexistent principles. The term plays an
important part in metaphysical, ethical and theological speculation.

_In Met