MAHOGANY: ECONOMICAL USES. This wood was first known in England in 1724, when Dr. Gibbons, a physician residing in King Street, Covent Garden, received a few planks from his brother, a captain in the West India trade. After much trouble, occasioned by the wood being too hard for the tools generally used by carpenters and cabinet makers, a candle-box and a bureau were made, and excited much admiration for the beauty of the wood. The fact became known, more planks were procured, and the cabinet-maker employed realised a /fortune by making articles of furniture in mahogany. From that year this wood began to supersede walnut and pear-tree in the houses of the rich.
The mahogany forests are chiefly in Cuba and Central America. The tree grows to so large a size, that logs of six or seven tons are frequently imported. The cost is chiefly made up of the expenses incident to the conveyance of such vast masses to the shipping ports, in countries where roads are few and the means of traction defective. The season for cutting commences in August. The men work in gangs of from fifty to a hundred each, under a huntsman to search out the best trees, and a captain to regulate operations. They deter mine on a sufficient number of trees to employ the whole gang during the season. Each tree is cut about ten or twelve feet from the ground, a stage being erected on which the men stand. The trunk is preferred for large timbers, but the branches for more beautiful grain, knots, curls, &c. The men live meanwhile in some sort of temporary village near a river, and construct a road from thence to the spot where the trees lie, often through dense forests of other kinds of wood, such as the bullet-tree, iron-wood, red-wood, and sapodilla. Their labour is exceedingly heavy, for many miles of road have often to be made, by clearing away the underwood with cutlasses, lopping down the trees with the axe, destroying the larger trunks by fire, levelling hillocks, and blasting rocky ground. By about December the roads are made : and the mahogany trunks are cut crosswise into logs, each of such size that a bullock-train can draw it. The largest log ever cut in Honduras is said to have been 17 feet long, 57 inches broad, 64 inches deep, and 15 tons weight ; on account of its beauty and value it was left of unusually large size, and additional oxen were set apart to draw it. When reduced to logs by cross-cutting, the mahogany is brought from the round to the square shape, by the axe. These operations being
finished by March, the two dry months of April and May are employed in dragging the timber to the river. The trucks employed require each seven pairs of oxen and two drivers ; and the logs are placed upon them by being dragged up a temporary inclined platform. To avoid the great beat of the sun in that climate, the loading and carrying are conducted at night, by torchlight. Arrived at the river, the legs are set afloat ; and when the rainy season of June has commenced, they are floated down to Belize or some other fort, the gangs rowing down in flat-bottomed canoes, and guiding the logs in their course.
When brought to England or any other market, the price varies extremely, being dependent partly on the size of the logs and partly on the beauty of the wood. When a log is fine enough to be cut up into broad and beautiful veneers, it will bring a high price. Some years ago Messrs. Broadwood, the eminent pianoforte manufactiirers, gave a higher price than has ever been known before or since for three logs of mahogany : namely, 2000/. Each log was 15 feet long by about 38 inches square. When cut into veneers of an eighth of an inch, the wood was peculiarly beautiful, susceptible of receiving the highest polish ; and when polished, it reflected the light in a very varied manner, like the surface of a crystal. The general figure of the grain resembled the ripple or small waves of water gently moved by the wind ; and on this account the wood, which for twenty years was employed for veneering some of the more costly pianofortes, obtained in the factory the name of ocean-wood. In this special example, the wood was Honduras mahogany; but in the general state of the market the Spanish is a finer kind, and brings a higher price. As a sort of average, Spanish mahogany is in logs about 10 feet long by 20 to 26 inches square ; while Honduras is 12 to 18 feet long, and from 2 to 4 feet square. Specimens of Honduras mahogany have come to market from wbich planks 7 feet in width could be cut. African mahogany twists more than Spanish or Honduras, and is inferior to them in most qualities except hardness. Mahogany warps less, and holds glue better, than most other kinds of wood, and on these accounts is much valued for cabinet work, besides its largeness of size and beauty of appearance.