^3 STATE HORTIOULTUEAL SOCIETY. 



It is not surprising that among all these noble trees there should 

 be a goodly number having historic and patriotic associations. There 

 are indeed many such — some intimately identified with the lives and 

 personjilities of great men in Washington now dead and gone, and 

 others connected with the names of statesmen still living. Most con- 

 spicuous and oldest among these historic memorial trees is one planted 

 by George Washington just a hundred years ago this spring. It occu- 

 pies a commanding position opposite the Senate portico, in the east 

 park of the Capitol, scarcely a stone's throw from the marble steps. It 

 is a superb specimen of the American elm, of gigantic proportions. 

 Its gnarled trunk is covered with clinging ivy, and the whole growth, 

 wonderfully symmetrical and well balanced, measures fully 100 feet in 

 height. Near it until 1^78, when the Capitol grounds were cut down 

 and improved in their present shape, stood its twin, planted by Wash- 

 ington at the same time and closely resembling it in appearance, but it 

 was cut down to make way for improvements. 



Almost as prominent as the original George Washington elm at the 

 Senate side of the Capitol is another elm of less size, near the House 

 entrance to the south, known as the " Cameron tree," in honor of the 

 late Simon Cameron, Secretary of War under Lincoln, for many years 

 United States Senator from Pennsylvania, and father of the present 

 Senator, J. Donald Cameron. While a member of the Senate Commit- 

 tee on Public Buildings and Grounds, in 1878, Senator Simon Cameron 

 intervened powerfully in its behalf, and prevented its destruction in 

 the regrading process by effectively repeating in the ears of the grading 

 commission the familiar line, " Woodman, spare that tree." It had 

 sheltered him from the sun on many a hot summer afternoon when he 

 lived across the street on New Jersey avenue; and, although it ob- 

 structed the principal path leading to the House of Representatives, 

 near the southern terrace, it was and has been permitted to live on ac- 

 count of the sentiment he entertained for it. The ground about it has 

 been trimmed down and stone flagging built around it, so that it derives 

 scant nourishment from the soil that is left ; but still it survives and 

 forms a striking and beautiful object of interest to visitors approach- 

 ing the House entrance from B street. 



Out near the Soldiers' home, on the Eobinson estate, is an ancient 

 locust tree that was particularly affected by Daniel Webster, when he 

 was a national figure in Washington. The friends whom he visited on 

 the place had a little platform built into the lower crotch of the tree 

 for his especial ease and comfort, and in that shady retreat the great 

 New England statesman used to spend hours at a time on summer 

 days, reading and meditating on affairs of public policy. 



