Rosewood.

Rosewood. The most valuable rosewood comes from Brazil. Two kinds, or two qualities, are known in commerce. These much resemble each other, the one, which is usually rather the better figured of the two, coming from Rio de Janeiro, and the other from Bahia. Although Brazilian rosewood has been used for making furniture in Europe for more than two hundred years, the species of tree or of trees which yield it are not known to European botanists. Mr Bentham, judging by the appearance of the wood and of the leaves of the tree, or of one of those rosewood trees, has assigned it to the genus Dalbergia. This view is probably correct. At all events there are three well-known Indian species of this genus called respectively D. latifolia, D. sissoo, and D. cultrata, all of which, except that they want the dark blotchy veining, closely resemble the Brazilian rosewoods. The cellular structure of the wood is similar in the whole of them. They are all rich in resinous colouring matter, and all except D. latifolia, which is slightly lighter, have a specific gravity ranging between 900 and 1000, so that they just float in water. Since at least 1830 the D. latifolia has been known in England as Indian rosewood. The South American and Indian kinds named above are all hard and durable, and take a fine polish. They are in every way excellent furniture woods, the Brazilian kinds being only more valuable because they are more beautifully figured. The Indian rosewood is often elaborately carved by native workmen, and for this purpose it is well suited. Of late years much of the furniture, even of a superior kind, made of mahogany in Great Britain, has been stained of a rosewood colour. An inferior kind of rosewood is brought from Honduras. The name is said to have been given because of a striking rose-like odour that the wood gives out when freshly cut.