The Forest Trees of Wiltshire. 149 
in this county. There are some fine trees at Longleat ; tall, straight, 
clean and sound, many of them probably measuring ten or twelve 
feet in circumference at three or four feet from the ground. At 
Tottenham also, you will find numbers answering to a like des- 
cription. Probably there may be giant ashes, as well as oaks, elms, 
and other trees in Wilts; but the writer has not fallen in the way 
of them, nor has he heard of any. The largest ash tree in this 
country is said to stand in Bedfordshire, at Woburn Park. Its 
height is stated at ninety feet; the stem alone being twenty-eight 
feet. At the ground its circumference is given as twenty-three 
feet six inches; at one foot, twenty feet; and at three feet from 
the ground, fifteen feet three inches. Doubtless this is a very fine 
tree; but it may well be questioned whether its description as the 
“largest in this country,”—a wide limit—is correct. It is highly 
probable that Jarger ones may be found in this county, for among 
q _ the old trees at Spye Park the writer has seen one—and there may 


be more—which may venture to compete with this “ Jargest ash.” 
The tree alluded to has a short trunk; and at three feet from the 
ground it is the same size as the Woburn tree, namely, fifteen feet 
in circumference. Of the three points of measurement given, this 
is the fairest for comparison, the ground or even one foot above it, 
not being any just criterion as to the size ofa tree. This Spye 
Park ash is somewhat remarkable in its growth and appearance ; 
for it has not a “head,” in the common acceptation of the term, 
but seven large limbs, each a timber in point of size, which spring 
from it, rising to a very considerable height, with clean stems, free 
from small branches either on them or at the top of the trunk 
itself. To account for such a singular form of growth, it is proba- 
ble that it was pollarded when quite a young tree, or that it lost 
its top from some accident. The ash is certainly a graceful tree, 
so much so in the estimation of some that G1LPIN, in his “ Forest 
Scenery ”’ calls it the “‘ Venus of the Woods,” whereupon the cele- 
brated Witi1am Consett, in his “ Woodlands,” makes the following 
quaint but true remark; alluding to its leaves, he says:—“ Well ; 
if the Ash be the ‘ Venus of the Woods,’ she certainly must be 
_ the naked Venus, for she is the last to put on her clothes, and the first 
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