THE DARLEY YEW. I I 7 



the Darley yew could not have grown faster than they have ; and 

 in order to intimate that it may very possibly be that it has grown 

 faster than they have. 



I have many apologies to offer for the details in this paper, 

 which I fear may be uninteresting to a great extent. My only 

 object has been to present the matter, as far as I could, in a 

 correct view ; and it seemed to be impossible to do so in any other 

 manner than in that which I have adopted. I shall be very 

 pleased if further information should be produced and greater 

 light thrown upon the subject. I have thought it better to 

 introduce the matter I have discovered since this paper was read 

 in the manner I have done than to recast the whole. This renders 

 the article not a little incongruous ; but in numerous instances it 

 proves that the views, which were originally presented, have been 

 fortified by facts which have subsequently come to light. 



A description of the most remarkable oak I have ever known 

 may be added as a note to this paper. In July, 1804, I began to 

 reside at Ingleby Hill, and in the Grass Hill, which is a field on 

 the right hand of the road to Knowl Hills, and nearest to the 

 house, there was an oak of unknown age. It was not remarkable 

 for its girth, which may have been five or six yards ; but it was 

 completely hollow from the ground to the top of the bole, with a 

 wide opening towards the west. There was a tradition that before 

 the field was inclosed, now more than 100 years ago, a man had 

 been chased by a bull, and had saved himself by getting into the 

 hollow of this tree. In my earliest years I and other children 

 used to get into the hollow. It is a property of the oak and some 

 other trees for the bark gradually to extend itself round the 

 edges of a hollow, or a place denuded of bark, and thus the 

 breadth of any opening into the trunk is decreased ; and 

 before I left the place in March, 1824, I had observed that this 

 process had begun in this oak. In 1872, 48 years afterwards, 

 when I revisited the place, I went to the tree to ascertain what 

 had occurred in the interval, and found that the right hand side 

 had increased very much in the line of the exterior of the bole, 

 but the left side had turned inwards, and nearly reached the back 



