DECIDUOUS ORNAMENTAL TREES. 145 



As beauty is often closely connected in our minds with 

 utility, we must be allowed a word on the great value of 

 this tree. For its useful properties the oak has scarcely 

 any superior. " To enumerate," says old Evelyn in his 

 quaint Sylva, " the incomparable uses of this wood were 

 needless ; but so precious was the esteem of it of old, there 

 was an express law among the Twelve Tables concerning 

 the very gathering of the acorns, though they should be 

 found fallen on another man's ground. The land and the 

 sea do sufficiently speak for the improvement of this excel- 

 lent material, for houses and ships, cities and navies, are 

 builded with it." In almost all the finest buildings of 



building, this tree might probably be in the meridian of its glory. It wa3 

 afterwards much injured in the reign of Charles II., when the present walks 

 were laid out. Its roots were disturbed, and from that time it declined fast 

 and became a mere trunk. The oldest members of the Univensity can hardly 

 recollect it in better plight ; but the faithful records of history have handed 

 down its ancient dimensions. Through a space of IG yards on every side it 

 once flung its branches ; and under its magnificent pavilion could have shel- 

 tered wth ease 3,000 men. In the summer of 1778 this magnificent ruin fell 

 to the ground. From a part of its ruins a chair has been made for the Presi- 

 dent of the College, which will long continue its memory." — Gilpin's Forest 

 Scenery. 



The King Oak, Windsor Forest, once the favorite tree of William the Con- 

 queror, is now more than 1,000 years old, and the interior of the trunk is quite 

 hollow. Professor Burnet, who described it, lunched inside this tree with a 

 party, and says it is capable of accommodating ten or twelve persons com- 

 fortably at dinner, sitting. 



The Beggar's Oak in Bagot's Park is twenty feet in girth five feet from the 

 ground. The roots rise above the surface in a very extraordinary manner, so 

 as to furnish a natural seat for the beggars chancing to pass along the pathway 

 near it ; and the circumference taken there is 68 feet. The branches extend 

 from the tree 48 feet in every direction. 



The Wallace Oak at Edenslee, near where Wallace was bom, is a nobb 

 tree 21 feet in circumference. It is 67 feet high, and its branches extend 45 

 feet east, 36 west, 30 south, and 25 north. Wallace and 300 of his men are 

 said to have hid themselves from the English among the branches of this tree 

 which was then in full leaf. 



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