112 jESCULUS hippocastanum. 
Lincolnshire It is represented as being a most magnificent tree, fifty-nine feet 
high, with immense branches, spreading over a space of three hundred and five 
feet in circumference. The branches are supported by props, so that at a little 
distance, the tree appears like an immense Indian banian. At Coombe Abbey, 
in Warwickshire, there is another tree of this species, which attained the height 
of seventy feet in one hundred years after planting, and had a trunk seven feet 
three inches in diameter, with an ambitus, or spread of branches, of one hundred 
and three feet. Sir T. Dick Lauder, speaking of horse-chesnuts in Scotland, 
says, " The horse-chesnuts on the lawn, which was formerly the garden of 
Dawick, the seat of Sir John Murray Nasmyth, Bart., a few miles from Peebles, 
in Tweeddale, are certainly the oldest and finest in Scotland ; or, perhaps, we 
should say there are none equal to them in Britain. They stand twelve feet 
from each other ; but they support a mass of foliage that appears to be but one 
head, which takes a beautiful form, and covers an area of ground, the diameter 
of which, is ninety-six feet. The larger of the two is in girt, immediately above 
the root, sixteen and a half feet. The smaller tree is twelve and a half feet in 
circumference at the base, and ten feet at three feet high." The age of these 
trees was estimated by him to be from one hundred and eighty to one hun- 
dred and ninety years. Mr. Loudon has recorded another tree of this species, 
as growing at Enfield, near London, which, in 1835, had attained the height of 
one hundred feet. 
The largest horse-chesnut in France, and which was considered as the parent 
stock from which all others have been propagated in that country, formerly 
existed in the garden of the Temple. The 'second tree of this species introduced 
into that kingdom, was planted in the Jardin des Plantes, in 1650, and died in 
1767. A section of its trunk is still preserved in the Museum of Natural History. 
There is a tree of this kind existing in the garden of the Tuileries, which is dis- 
tinguished, even in summer, from all others in the same garden, by the profusion 
of flowers with which it is covered, and also by the earliness of their putting 
forth. It is said to unfold its leaves always a fortnight earlier than any others, 
which is exemplified by the following historical incident. On Napoleon's entry 
into Paris, on the 20th of March, 1815, after his return from the island of Elba, 
this tree furnished to him and his friends, foliage for their personal decoration, 
l eing the only tree in the leaf in the garden of the Tuileries. 
In Germany, the horse-chesnut, after having been planted at Vienna, soon 
tound its way to Baden, where it was planted about the end of the XVIth cen- 
tury, and where some of the trees are said to be still in existence. 
The introduction of the common horse-chesnut into the United States probably 
dates back to about the middle of the XVIIth century. The tree, supposed to be 
the first brought to this country, is still standing on the estate of Mr. Lemuel W. 
Wells, of Yonkers, (formerly Phillipsburgh,) New York, and is ten feet in cir- 
cumference at a yard above the ground, sixty-five feet in height, with an ambi- 
tus, or spread of branches of fifty feet. It is in a flourishing condition, and bears 
a profusion of fruit, from which the New York nurseries and seed-stores are 
annually supplied. It is said to have been planted by Frederick Philipse, the 
founder of Phillipsburgh, who formerly lived on the place of its present proprietor. 
In the vicinity of this tree there are numerous others of nearly the same magni- 
tude, which were raised from its nuts, and from the accounts of the oldest resi- 
dents of Yonkers, they have not increased materially in size within their recol- 
lection. 
Poetical and Legendary Allusions. The horse-chesnut, when allowed to attain 
its proper shape on a lawn, has been compared by some authors to an immense " lus- 
tre or chandelier," its long racemes of flowers tapering up from its drooping foli- 
age like light; a "giant's nosegay;" a " gigantic hyacinth ;" a " Brobdignagian 
