CHAP. Cl. ULMA CER. U’LMUS. 1391 
“ Mine own hands,” he adds, “ measured a table more than once, of about 5 ft. 
in breadth, 94 ft. in length, and 6 in. thick, all entire and clear. This, cut out 
of a tree felled by my father’s order, was made a pastry board.... The incom- 
arable walks at the royal palaces in the neighbourhood of Madrid were planted,” 
e continues, “with this majestic tree.” These are said to have been the first 
elms that were planted in Spain; and Baron Dillon tells us that, when he saw 
them, about the end of the last century, they were 6 ft. in diameter, and in a 
healthy state. The plants were taken from England by Philip II., who had 
married Mary Tudor, daughter of Henry VIII., and Queen of England. 
Henry LV. of France planted an elm in the gardens of the Luxembourg, in Paris, 
which stood till it was destroyed during the first French revolution. An elm in 
Switzerland, near Morges, at the time it was blown down, had a trunk 17 ft. 
7 in. in diameter, and was estimated to be 335 years old. Queen Elizabeth is 
said to have planted an elm at Chelsea, which was cut down in 1745, and 
sold for a guinea by the lord of the manor, Sir Hans Sloane, It was supposed 
to have become a nuisance to the public road, close to which it stood, from 
its great size andage. It was 13 ft. in circumference at the ground, and half as 
much at the height of 44ft. Before the hard frost in 1739-40 had injured its 
top, it was 110 ft. high. The Crawley Elm, which has been figured by Strutt, 
stands on the high road from London to Brighton. It is 70 ft. high, and the 
trunk is 61 ft. in circumference at the ground. Its trunk is perforated to the 
very top; and it measures 35ft. round the inside at 2 ft. from the base. There 
is a regular door to the cavity in this tree, the key of which is kept by the lord 
of the manor; but it is opened on particular occasions,when the neighbours meet 
to regale themselves within the cavity, which is capable of containing a party 
of more than a dozen. The floor is paved with bricks. Madame de Genlis 
says a poor woman gave birth to an infant in the hollow of this tree, where 
she afterwards resided for a long time A hollow elm stood formerly at 
Hampstead, but in what spot is uncertain. It was engraved by the cele- 
brated Hollar, in 1653; and fig. 1238. is a copy of it from Parke’s Hampstead, 
reduced to the scale of lin. to 12ft. “ The Great Hollow Elm Tree of 
Hampstead,” as it is called in the engraving, was upwards of 42 ft. high. - It 
was hollow from the ground to the summit, from which the trunk appears to 
have been abruptly broken off ; and in the hollow a wooden stair, or ladder, was 
formed, which conducted to a turret on the top, containing seats on which six 
persons might sit. The following quaint description is given on the margin of 
the engraving: —“1. The bottom above ground, in compass, is 28 foote. 
2. The breadth of the doore is 2 foote. 3. The compass of the turret on 
the top is 34 foote. 4. The doore in height to goe in is 6 foote 2inches. 8. 
The height of the turret is 33 foote. 11. The lights into the tree is 16. 
18. The stepps to goe up is 42. 19. The seat above the stepps six may sitt on, 
and round about roome for foureteene moore. All the way you goe up within 
the hollow tree.” (Parke’s Hampstead, p. 34.) About the time that the 
engraving was published, a number of rhymes were printed on the subject of 
this tree, some of them by Robert Codrington; and others were printed by 
FE. Cotes, and were “ to be given or sold in the Hollow Tree at Hampstead.” 
Hollar’s engraving appears also to have been sold at the tree. Nine elm trees, 
standing on Hampstead Heath in 1805, were celebrated in a poem by Edward 
Coxe, Esq., published in that year. (Jbid., p. 40.) In a manuscript lent to 
Professor Martyn by Craven Ord, Esq., of Purser’s Cross, and probably 
written by Oldys (the translator of Camden’s Britannia, who died in 1761), 
mention is made of several remarkable elms. One at Charlton, in Kent, 
about which it is said Horn Fair was kept, spread 8 yards on every side; the 
height was about 10 yards, but the trunk not above 1 ft. in diameter. One of 
Sir Francis Bacon’s elms, in Gray’s Inn walks, planted in 1600, was felled, 
upon a suspected decay, in 1720 or 1726, and was 12 ft. round; its head 
contained 45 ft. of timber. In 1750, not above eight trees of his planting were 
left. They were planted in 1600, At Fulham are, or were, some elms planted 
in the time of King Edward VI.; and one at Richmond, said to be planted by 
4yY 
