WOOD. sub. A solid substance, of which the trunks and branches of trees consist.
1. This term is employed to denote the solid parts of vegetables of all kinds, in whatever form or circumstances they are found. Nor does this term admit of plural with propriety, unless in the circumstances after-mentioned: for we say, many different kinds of wood, in preference to many kinds of woods; or, we say, oak, ash, or elm wood, not woods.
2. But where we want to contrast wood of one quality or country with that of another, it admits of a plural: for we say, white woods are in general softer than red; or West-Indian woods are in general of greater specific gravity than the European woods: But unless where the colour, or some quality which distinguishes it from growing wood, is mentioned, this plural ought as much as possible to be avoided, as it always suggests an idea of growing wood.
3. Wood likewise denotes a number of trees growing near one another; being nearly synonymous with forest: See FOREST. In this sense it always admits of a plural; as, Ye woods and wilds woofe solitary glens, &c.
A dictionary cannot be reckoned complete without explaining obsolete words; and if the terms of the te-
Dictionary. veral provincial dialects were likewise given, it would be of great utility: nor would this take much time; because a number of these words needs no other explanation than to mark along with them the words which had come in their place, when there happened to be one perfectly synonymous: and in those cases where the same idea could not be expressed in modern language without a periphrasis, it would be of use to explain them distinctly; so that, when a writer found himself at a loss for a term, and obliged to search for one beyond the bounds of our own language, he might take one of these, when he found that it was expressive and energetic, in preference to another drawn from a foreign language. This would at least have one good effect: it would make our language more fixed and stable; not to say more accurate and precise, than by borrowing from foreign languages. The following examples may serve to give some idea of the manner of treating this part of the work.