340 



" Three hundred years the oak expends in growth, 

 Three hundred years in majesty stands forth, 

 Three hundred years declines and wastes away. 

 Then dies, and takes three hundred to decay." 



lolo: MS. 



Another oak tree mentioned in Strutt's Sylva Eritannica is the Salcey 

 Forest Oak in Northamptonshire, an uttter ruin, frapped through and through, 

 but still said to measure 40 feet 10 inches at three feet from the ground. 



Before leaving the subject nf comparison of the two greatest oaks in the 

 kingdom, it is worthy of remark that the bough of the oak tree in the lawn of Oak 

 House, Newland, which fell from the overweight of snow, exhibits, at its junction 

 with the trunk, the enormous diameter of thirty-four inches, or nine feet in 

 circumference. 



Dendrologists have some difficulties to contend with in the discrepancies of 

 measurements given by different observers. Here are a few instances : — The 

 girth of the Cowthorpe Oak at its base is given in Hunter's notes to Evelyn's 

 " Sylva " (1776) as seventy-eight feet, and the same dimensions are given by Strutt 

 in 1822 ; whilst a writer in " Notes and Queries " made it fifty feet in 1857, and 

 Mr. W. Brailsford writing in 1884 made it fifty -three feet The measurements 

 at three feet from the ground differ similarly. Measurements even taken by the 

 same person vary — for instance, our Honorary Secretary, Mr. Moore, measuring the 

 Newland Oak tree on September 15, 1887 — (see ante page 176)— in company with 

 Dr. T. A. Chapman, an equally accurate observer, made its girth at five feet from 

 the ground 41 feet 10 inches ; and to-day, June 18, 1889, Mr. Moore, under the 

 observations of the goodly company here assembled, reports the measurement 

 43 feet 6 inches at the same height. Much as the surveyor may endeavour to avoid 

 excrescences and to give a truthful measurement, he rarely succeeds in getting his 

 first calculation corroborated to the nicety he desires. 



Here is another flagrant instance of discrepancy in measurements. A 

 correspondent (Mr. Southwell) in the Standard gives the girth of the Winfarthing 

 Oak as forty feet, but unfortunately omits to state at what height ! In Ablett's 

 book the circumference is given as seventy feet in 1820 — see " The Growtli of 

 Trees," Standard, October, 10th, 1889. 



The following notes were contributed by Mr. F. Bainbridge on 

 "THE COWTHORPE OAK." 



Presumably the original name, Colthorpe, was derived from Col — a hill. 

 This village on a hill is in the West Riding of Yorkshire, near Ribston Hall (the 

 seat of the Dent family), whence was produced the esteemed apple, the Ribston 

 Pippin. For a representation of the last remnant of the original Ribston Pippin 

 tree in its honoured age, see the text accompanying Plate XXV. of "The 

 Herefordshire Pomona." 



The oak tree for which the village of Cowthorpe is celebrated is acknowledged 

 to be the oldest in Britain, and is certainly a splendid specimen of its genus. The 



