84 TREE-PLANTING. 



foliage down to the surface of the ground. It is said 

 this species will retain its vigour for a thousand years, 

 and it is not subject to disease. Its timber is tough, 

 strong, and heavy. Trees of the evergreen oak have 

 been recorded standing in Britain in the one case, 

 eighty-five feet in height, and eleven feet in circum- 

 ference, another fifty-five feet high and twenty-two feet 

 round ; while in another instance the tree measured 

 forty-five feet high with a trunk upwards of thirteen 

 feet in circumference. It is a native of the south of 

 Europe and the north of Africa. 



The Cork Tree (Q. suber). A native of the same 

 countries as the common evergreen oak, it is not so 

 hardy where it abounds on hilly and dry situations, 

 seldom attaining a height above forty feet. Loudon, 

 describing what he considers may probably be the 

 largest cork tree in the world, at Mamhead in Devon- 

 shire, says : " The head of the tree is oval and 

 compact, and its grand massive branches, each of 

 which would form a tree of noble dimensions, are 

 covered with ragged corky bark, resembling richly- 

 chased frosted silver, which is finely contrasted with 

 the dark-green luxuriant foliage ; " the tree being 

 about sixty feet high with a trunk twelve feet in 

 circumference from the swell of the roots, standing 

 alone in a soil of fine, rich, red loam, on a sub-stratum 

 of red-stone conglomerate, 1 50 feet above the level of 

 the sea. 



It is propagated exactly in the same way in this 

 country as the evergreen oak, the outer bark of the 

 tree being the cork of commerce, which is by far its 

 most important product. The cork is obtained in the 

 following manner : When the tree is young the trunk 



