KEV. DK. GEE — FAMOUS TEEES Ilf HEETFOEDSHIEE. 13 



Boscohcl transaction, the oak leaves were worn.* Of this Boscobel 

 tree, let me say (before I leave the subject) a descendant is said to 

 exist in Gadebridge Park, Sir A. Cooper's ; but my inquiries after 

 the triith of the tradition have been unsuccessful. But Hatfield 

 Park has later trees of Royal fame. On the occasion of a visit 

 paid by Her present Majesty and the Prince Consort to the late 

 Marquis of Salisbury, they were pleased to plant trees in the 

 immediate neighbourhood of Queen Elizabeth's Oak, and a triad 

 of royally famous trees may thus be seen at once in this specially 

 favoured spot (Fig. 3). 



I have not quite done with Queen Elizabeth and her connexion 

 with Hertfordshire and Hertfordshire trees. There is another 

 domain in Hertfordshire or its borders, only less closely connected 

 with this royal lady than is Hatfield. Look into the index to Miss 

 Strickland's 'Biographies,' and you will find some half-dozen refer- 

 ences to Ashridge. I have heard that the house at Ashridge stands 

 partly in one county and partly in another. The parish church, 

 Little Gaddesden, where the Bridgewater family lie buried, is in 

 Hcrtfordshii-e. Of the ashes which gave name to that ridge only 

 one remains, as far as I could observe on my visit the other day. 

 Under this tree, or one of its fellows, we may think the Princess 

 Elizabeth also sat, and so very likely used to sit the " bons hommes " 

 of Ashridge — the hermit priests who formerly owned that beautiful 

 spot, and who lie in the church which the house itself includes. 



It will be next in chronological order to notice the Oak Wood in 

 Gorhambury. This is a wood at the back of the house, specially so 

 called. When Lord Chancellor Bacon was in financial difiiculties, 

 it was suggested to him that he should cut down this particular 

 wood. "What! man," said he, "would you have me pluck out 

 my own feathers?" And so the trees escaped, and some, I believe, 

 are now standing. The circumstance is told in most Lives of Lord 

 Bacon as if it applied to oaks generally, and they are spelt with a 

 little "o." Lord Verulam informs me that the tale hangs round 

 the particular Oak Wood, as distinct from others. Brook Wood, 

 etc. And Barnard, in his ' Drawings from Nature,' states, I do not 

 know on what authority, that the first Oriental planes introduced 

 into England were planted at Gorhambury by the great Loi-d Bacon. 



I now come to Moor Park to notice two traditions with regard to 

 trees there. Moor Park was once owned by Cardinal Wolsey, 

 perhaps in virtue of his connexion with St. Albans as Ahhot in com- 

 mendam. There is a tree which, Lord Ebury tells me, still goes by 

 the name of the Cardinal's Oak. He described to me its exact 

 situation. Lord Ebury thinks that it had its name rather from the 

 fact of the Cardinal having sat under it than having planted it. 

 It is too old, according to Dryden's lines, to have had its beginnings 

 only some 350 years ago. The other Moor Park tradition is as to 

 the beheading of certain trees there. The estate undoubtedly be- 



* Is there any authority for supposing that the Oak had previously been the 

 badge of the chm Stuart? After 1745 many a soldier was punished for putting 

 an oak leaf in his cap on May 29. 



