1893.] EssArs. 65 



Rice's Corner is the birthplace of the popular story writer, Mrs. 

 Mary J. Holmes, and in one of her published works, "Homestead 

 ou the Hillside," if I mistake not, she makes reference to the big 

 tree. 



Scarcely an eighth of a mile from the tree, by the roadside, are 

 three other chestnut trees, and each one of these approaches in size 

 the one described. This trio of great trees stands in a field to the 

 west of the highway, that is half pasture and half woodland, and 

 the best preserved of the three is easily seen from the road. This 

 tree girths at three feet from the ground 1(3 feet and 5 inches, and at 

 one foot 19 feet and 7 inches. Its trunk is clear of limbs for twelve 

 feet. 



The second of the trio girths at three feet 17 feet and 4 inches, and 

 at one foot 19 feet and 7 inches. Both of the trio mentioned have 

 straight trunks, and though their branches are now short, knurled 

 and scraggly, there are abundant evidences that when they were in 

 their prime they must have borne immense tops. 



The last of the trio comes quite near in size to the first of the 

 " big four" herein described, for at four feet it has a circumference 

 of 17 feet and 10 inches, and at two feet its girth is 21 feet and 

 2 inches. 



One of this trio, and the oldest one of all, stands on the western 

 declivity of a hill, and its shorn branches appear just above a growth 

 of white birches. Its bark is a decided curiosity, for it is deeply and 

 profusely furrowed and so spiral as to extend from the base to the 

 point of furcation, full half-way round the tree. One of the furrows, 

 as measured, shows a depth of seven inches, and the ridge it forms 

 is five inches across. The bark of the greater branches is also spiral, 

 and altogether the tree has a rare and singular appearance. 



Each one of these four trees will give a saw log of twelve feet, 

 which will make on an average, allowing the trunks to be sound, 

 which they are not, of 3,000 feet, — a total of 12,000 feet. 



The first mentioned of these four trees is the largest I have yet 

 seen or heard of in Worcester County, except an elm in Lancaster. 



The town of Westborough is rich in the number of shade trees that 

 line its public streets and roads ; and its arboreal wealth is, to a great 

 extent, of a mature nature, as the planting of shade trees along its 

 streets is not a custom of comparative recent adoption, as is the case 

 with many Worcester County villages and towns. 



Conspicuous for their size and numbers are stately white ashes, 

 which appear to live admirably in Westborough soil. 



