THE OAK. 33 



plant in question, commonly called Bracken, and 

 by botanists Pteris Aquilina, is cut slantwise a short 

 distance above the root, the section of the sap- 

 vessels gives a kind of rude drawing of an ancient 

 oak, loaded with exuberant foliage that bends the 

 massive branches towards the ground. A thousand 

 strange resemblances of this nature might be de- 

 scribed, showing that our world is positively one 

 of echoes not necessarily for the ear, but rather 

 and mainly for the eye, which in its powers and 

 privileges is the synthesis and compend of all the 

 organs of sense. 



Lastly, concerning the oak, should be mentioned 

 the mighty age which it attains 



" The monarch oak, the patriarch of trees, 

 Shoots rising up, and spreads by slow degrees ; 

 Three centuries he grows, and three he stays 

 Supreme in state, and in three more decays." 



Nine hundred years, that is to say, constitute the 

 ordinary term of oak-life. But there are in Great 

 Britain many examples of oak-trees of ages far ex- 

 ceeding this. The Salcey-forest Oak in Northamp- 

 tonshire, described by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder as 

 " one of the most picturesque sylvan ruins that can 

 be met with anywhere/' is calculated on good grounds 

 to be more than fifteen hundred years old ; while 

 in Clipstone Park, Nottinghamshire, stands a vene- 

 rable tree called the Parliament Oak, from a tradi- 



