1976 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 
France ; Roque’s Hist. des Champ.; &c.) Rhizo- 
pogon albus F’r., Berk, Eng. Fi., v. part 11. p. 229. 
syn. Tuber album Bull, t. 404., Sow., t. 310., and 
our fig. 1815.; J. albidum Cesalp.; Lycopérdon 
gibbésum Dicks. Crypt., ii. p. 26.; Truffle blanche, 
Fr.; the White Truffle; is also eaten. It is rare both 
in France and England ; but is sometimes found, in 
both countries, in sandy woods, and is common in 
Germany. It has occurred in the Botanic Garden 
at Glasgow. P ‘ 
The price of morels, dry, in Covent Garden market, varies from 16s. a pound 
to 20s.; and in Paris the fresh morels ‘are from 50 to 60 cents the pottle. 
_Truffles, when dry, are about 14s. a pound in Covent Garden market ; and 
fresh English truffles are from 3s. 6d. to 5s.a pound. Fresh truffles vary in 
Paris, according to their quality, from 50 cents to 3 francs per pound. 
Lichens. We are informed by W. Borrer, Esq., tht ; 
the only lichens known to him,as peculiar to the beech, 
are, Opégrapha vendsa and Parmeélia speciosa. O. ve~ 
nosa Eng. Bot., t. 2454., and our fig. 1816., is found 
on the trunks of beech trees in the New Forest, 
Hampshire. Sir J. E. Smith describes the ramifica- 
tions of this lichen as being “ deeply sunk into the 
crust, but convex above, and intensely black, with ob- 
tuse terminations.” (See Eng. Fi.,v. pl. 1. p. 148.) , 
The name of Opégrapha alludes to the supposed resemblance of the lichens 
which compose this genus to Hebrew characters inscribed on the wood. 
P. speciosa Ach. Syn., p. 221., Lichen specidsus Wulf. Eng. Bot., 1979., 
the elegant garland parmelia, is usually found on rocks; but Mr. Borrer 
informs us that it is also found on the beech. “ The fructification of this 
lichen has not been found in Great Britain; but it is described from specimens 
gathered in North America.” (Eng. F/., v. pl. 1. p. 202.) Dr. Taylor, how- 
ever, finds it “not very rare near Dunkerron, county of Kerry.” (7. Hib., 
pt. ii. p. 149.); and a single specimen has occurred in St. Leonard’s Forest, 
Sussex. 
Statistics. Recorded Trees. The Great Beech, in Windsor Forest, of which an engraving is given 
by Strutt in his Sy/va Britannica, and of which our fig. 1907. is a copy, reduced’to a scale of Lin. to 
50 ft., is evidently of very great antiquity. It is supposed to have existed before the Norman Con- 
quest; and it is mentioned by Cambden as “ standing ona high hill (Sunning Hill), and overlooking 
a vale lying out far and wide; garnished with corn fields, flourishing with meadows, decked with 
groves on either side, and watered with the Thames.” According to Jesse, the trunk of this tree 
measures, at 6 ft. from the ground, 36 ft. round. “It is now,” he says, 5 
“protected from injury, and Nature seems to be doing her best to- 
wards repairing the damage which its exposure to the attacks of man 
and beast had produced. It must once have been almost hollow; 
but the vacuity (as shown in jig. 1908.}, has now been nearly filled 
up. One might almost fancy that liquid wood, which had afterwards 
hardened, had been poured into the tree. The twistings and dis- 
tortions of this huge substance have a curious and striking effect ; 
and one might almost imagine them to have been produced bya 
convulsive throe of nature. (See jig. 1907. in p. 1977.,0n a larger 
scale, copied from Jesse’s Gleanings.) There is no bark on this.extra- 
neous substance; but the surface is smooth, hard, and without any 
appearance of decay.” (Jesse’s Gleanings in Nat. Hist., 2d:s., 
p. 112.) A beech at Bicton, in Devonshire, blown down in 1806, had 
a trunk which measured 29 ft. in circumference, and a head which _ ¥ 
was 103ft. in diameter. The Burnham Beeches stand in a tract of 
woodland above 4 miles from Stoke Pogis, in Buckinghamshire, 1907 
which is celebrated as the scene of Gray’s poetic musings. ‘* Both vale and hill,” says Gray, 
“are covered with most venerable beeches ;” and in his Evegy he particularly mentions “‘ the nod? 
ding beech, that wreathes its old fantastic roots so high.’’ In Scotland, a very large beech stood atNew- 
battle Abbey, in Mid-Lothian. It was measured by Dr. Walker, in 1789 ; when the trunk was found 
to be 17 ft. in circumference, and the diameter of the head 89ft. It contained upwards of 1000 ft. 
of timber. It was blown down by a gale of wind about 1809. Dr. Walker thinks it must have 
been planted between 1540 and 1560. A beech tree at Preston Hall, Mid-Lothian, at 1 ft. from the 
ground, measured 17 ft, 3 in. in circumference; and at 4 ft. 14ft. Gin. A beech at Taymouth, 
seemingly coeval with that at Newbattle Abbey, was blown down when its trunk was above 16 ft. 
round. ‘A number of other fine beech trees, which existed in Scotland in the time of Dr. Walker, 
are noticed in his Essays on Natural History, to which Mr. Sang and Sir T. Dick Lauder have added 
several other remarkable examples. In Ireland, there are a number of large beech trees, the dimen- 
sions of which have been recorded by Hayes. At Shelton Abbey, near Arklow, there are 7 beech 
trees, the trunks of which measure from 13 tt. 9 in. to 15 ft. in circumference ; and there are upwards 
1906 
