THE OAK. 97 
that handsome tower which is so ornamental to the 
whole building, this tree might probably be in the 
meridian of its glory; or rather, perhaps, it had at- 
tained a green old age. It was afterward much injured 
in the reign of Charles II., when the present walks 
were laid out. Its roots were disturbed; and from 
that period it declined fast, and became reduced to a 
mere trunk. Through a space of 16 yards on every 
side from its trunk, it once flung its boughs, and 
under its magnificent pavilion could have sheltered 
with ease 3000 men. In the summer of 1788, this 
magnificent ruin fell to the ground.” 
“The Cowthorpe Oak, in Yorkshire, measures at 
its base 78 feet in circumference. The space occu- 
pied by this tree, where the trunk meets the ground, 
exceeds the ground-plot of that majestic column, the 
Eddystone Light-house ; and horizontal slices of Da- 
morey’s Oak would have laid every floor in one piece 
throughout the whole building.” 
The oak and the chestnut are very closely con- 
nected, not only in their appearance, but also in their 
general character. The leaves of the chestnut and 
the chestnut-oak would be mistaken for each other 
by one unaccustomed to the difference, those of the 
chestnut being only a little more sharply toothed than 
the other. 
In California, a species of oak has been discovered, 
whose mode of flowering, and indeed the whole ap- 
pearance of the tree, is so similar to that of the chest- 
nut, as to require the presence of the fruit fully to 
determine its identity. The wood of each also bears 
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