8 FAMILIAR TREES 



manufacture of that commodity from oak-galls and 

 green vitriol, or in its union with the bog-iron of 

 peat-mosses that yield the well-known black bog- 

 oak. 



The Oak is attacked by a great variety of 

 insects. Of the galls produced by these, the com- 

 monest are the marble-gall, whose brown spheres, 

 clustered together especially on the branches of 

 pollards, form quite a feature among the russet 

 leaves of autumn ; the oak-apple, those soft, rosy- 

 cheeked excrescences which are popularly associated 

 with the escape of Charles II. ; the oak-spangles 

 that stud the under surfaces of the leaves, at first 

 with crimson and then with amber-brown ; and 

 the artichoke-gall, which makes the overlapping 

 scales of the diseased bud closely simulate the 

 bracts of the vegetable from which it is named. 



Like all our finest trees, the Oak is seen at 

 its best when standing alone in the park. The 

 straight stem of a tree not yet aged ; its rugged 

 bark, flecked with many tints; the broken but 

 rounded outlines of its well- leafed top ; the pink 

 Lammas shoots of summer and the russet leaves of 

 autumn ; all add their various beauty to the 

 majesty of the forest monarch. There is a solemn 

 grandeur about such venerable, if somewhat decrepit 

 veterans as the great Newland Oak, which exceeds 

 forty-seven feet in girth; but for true beauty 

 vigorous maturity must always surpass the appeals 

 of decadent glories to a half-pitying admiration. 



