Mar. 1903.] BOTAXICAL SOCIET\^ OF EDINBURGH 413 



With the knowledge that trees are not necessarily old if 

 they have a large girth, — for trees with a large girth always 

 grows faster than those with a less girth, and in proportion 

 to the size they ultimately attain. Yet it seems absurd to 

 ascribe four hundred years as the duration of the Ufe of the 

 Cowthorpe Oak, which for seventy years has been regarded 

 nearly as old as the Christian era. However, all trust- 

 worthy evidence favours such a term, and if we incline to 

 extend it to five hundred or six hundred years, it is more 

 than the evidence warrants. Two hundred years since, 

 the older generation of oaks at Castle Howard must have 

 been fine trees, otherwise the fastidious founder of that 

 place would have cut them down. Indeed, their condition 

 would be like that of the Cowthorpe Oak, as it is nearly 

 two hundred years since the first great branch was severed 

 from it, and before that date its proportions were exceed- 

 ingly grand, and no signs of decay had appeared. Since 

 then the decline of the Cowthorpe Oak and the old oaks 

 at Castle Howard has been about equal, and the circum- 

 stances of both are so parallel that whatever age is assigned 

 to one must by all that is reasonable be assigned to the 

 other. 



The rapid progress of decay in the Cowthorpe Oak is 

 another circumstance that points to a moderate duration of 

 its life. Dr. Hunter's picture represents the tree in 1776. 

 In 1893, scarcely one hundred and twenty years after the 

 photograph. Photo. No. 4 represents the tree. If the tree 

 was hollow in Dr. Hunter's time, it is not apparent in his 

 print, nor does he speak of it in his letter-press description. 

 Thomas Maude saw the tree in 1774, and he made a cal- 

 culation showing the quantity of timber in it, supposing 

 the trunk to be sound. Robert Marsham measured the 

 tree in 1768, and he does not say anything about the 

 tree being liollow. Hence if the tree was hollow one 

 hundred and twenty years since, it could not be seen 

 from the outside, otherwise one of these observers would 

 certainly have seen it and mentioned it. In 1893 the 

 diameter of the hollow on the ground was 13 ft. one way, 

 and 9 ft. the other, and it had two entrances. 



Perhaps there is nothing which shows so forcibly the rapid 

 progress of decay as the contrast between Dr. Hunter's print 



