AND ROBERT MARSHAM. 247 



was down to 1. I take the liberty to tell you this, as it pos- 

 sibly may be entertaining to you to see the difference of less 

 than 2 Degrees of Lat. 



Sir, when you print a 2 d Edition, (which the merit of your 

 Book will certainly soon demand) i hope in your description 

 of the Holt Forest, you will pay a compliment, justly due, to 

 the Oak by Ld Stawel's Lodge : as I suppose it is the largest 

 in this Island. I went from London on purpose to see it 

 in 1759, and again occasionally in 1778. 'Tis at 7 feet full 

 34 feet in circumf. & had not gained half an inch in 19 years; 

 yet i could not see it was hollow. If i measure right i make 

 14 feet length of the Holt Oak to contain above 1000 feet, 

 viz. above 320 feet more than the Cowthorpe Oak, which D r 

 Hunter, in his Edition of Evelyn's Silva*, calls the largest in 

 England. I early begun planting, & an Oakef which i 

 planted in 1720 is at one foot from the earth 12 feet. 6. inches. 

 round; and at 14 feet (the half of the timber length) is 

 8.2.0. So measuring the bark as timber, gives 116F. J, buyers 

 measure. Perhaps you never heard of a larger Oake & the 

 planter living. I flatter myself, that i increased the growth 

 by washing the stem, & digging a circle as far as i supposed 

 the roots to extend, & spreading saw-dust, &c. as related in 

 the Phil. Trans J. I wish I had begun planting with beeches 

 (my favourite Trees as well as your's), & i might have seen 

 large trees of my own raising. But i did not begin Beeches 

 'till 1741, & then by seed ; & my largest is now, at 5 feet, 

 6.3.0 round, & spreads a circle of + 20 yards diam r . But 



this has been digged round & washed, &c. The last Winter 



was so very mild with us, that the leaves of many of my very 

 young Oaks preserved their green into April, & a large Haw- 

 thorn (headed the proceeding year) has its old leaves now : 

 which i never observed before, in any deciduous trees : tho' 



* [' Silva : or, a Discourse of Forest-trees, &c. By John Evelyn. With 

 notes by A. Hunter.' New Ed., 2 vols. 4to, York : 1780 ; vol. ii. p. 197. 

 The Cowthorpe Oak grew on an estate belonging to Lady Stourton, and 

 an engraving of it is given by Hunter, who introduces his notice of it by 

 a reference to "My ingenious friend Mr. Marsham." A. N.] 



t [See Vol. I. p. 407.] 



| [Vol. Ixvii. p. 12. A. N.] 



