THE OAK. 27 



advantage. I mention these mechanical uses only because 

 some of its chief beauties are connected with them. Thus, 

 it is not the erect, stately tree that is always the most 

 useful in ship- building, but more often the crooked one, 

 forming short turns and elbows, which the shipwrights 

 and carpenters commonly call knee-timber. This, too, is 

 generally the most, picturesque. Nor is it the straight, 

 tall stem, whose fibres run in parallel lines, that is the 

 most useful in bearing burdens ; but that whose sinews 

 are twisted, and spirally combined. This, too, is the most 

 picturesque. Trees under these circumstances generally 

 take the most pleasing forms." l 



The admirable qualities of Oak as a material for build- 

 ing, and other purposes, were known to our ancestors in 

 ages long past, scarcely any other timber being found in 

 any buildings of very high antiquity. The doors of the 

 inner chapels of Westminster Abbey are said to be coeval 

 with the original building : if this be true, they must be 

 more than twelve hundred years old. The shrine of 

 Edward the Confessor, in the same abbey, is also of Oak, 

 and must be nearly eight hundred years old. In the 

 county-hall at Winchester is preserved Arthur's round- 

 table, so well known in stories of English chivalry. It 

 bears the figure of that Prince, and the names of several 

 of his knights. Henry VIII. is said to kave taken great 

 pleasure in showing this table to his illustrious visitor, 

 Charles V., as the actual oaken table made and placed 

 there by the renowned British Prince, Arthur, who lived 

 in the early part of the sixth century ; that is, about 1,300 

 years ago. Hence the poet Dra}'ton sings : 



" Aud so great Arthur's seat ould Winchester prefers, 

 Whose ould round table 3'et she vaunteth to be hers." 



It must have been cut from a tree of immense girth, as 

 it measures eighteen feet in diameter. It has been per- 

 forated in many places by bullets, supposed to have been 

 shot by Cromwell's soldiers. 



1 Gilpin's Forest Scenery. 



