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var
[< dial.var. of fir]
Atlantic Provinces
DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
Spelling variants:varr (obs.)
Entry from the DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
This entry may contain outdated or offensive information, terms, and examples.
n.
the balsam fir; also, its wood.
See: balsam (fir)(</i>defs 1 and 2)
Quotations
</i>1793
The men set to work, and . . . cut the crops of a species of ever green wood, which they call varr [in New Brunswick].
1842
For some distance, too, the bark of the spruce pine, (pinus balsamifera) called var in Newfoundland, probably from a west of England corruption of fir, was taken off, it being one of the customs of the Boeothics to use the inner bark as food.
1904
The woodman's axe, forest fires and the fore-time prosperous ship-building industry have swept away the "Forest primeval," leaving but insignificant growths of the cone-bearing, soft wood species, the commonest being the balsam, fir or var, and spruce.
1959
In the feel of drawknife in wood, smoothing a shingle out of straight-grained var, there was something that smoothed the mind.