1778 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 



each ; making a total of 2426 cubic feet of convertible timber. The bark was 

 estimated at 6 tons ; but, as some of the very heavy body bark was stolen out 

 of the barge at Newport, the exact weight is not known. Five men were 

 20 days stripping and cutting down this tree ; and two sawyers were 5 months 

 converting it, without losing a day, Sundays excepted. The main trunk was 

 9^ ft. in diameter ; and, in sawing it through, a stone was discovered 6 ft. from 

 the ground, above a yard in the body of the tree, through which the saw cut. 

 The stone was about 6 in. in diameter, and was completely shut in; but around 

 it there was not the least symptom of decay. The rings in the but were care- 

 fully counted, and amounted to upwards of four hundred in number ; a con- 

 vincing proof that this tree was in an improving state for upwards of four 

 hundred years ; and, as the ends of some of its branches were decayed, and 

 had dropped off, it is presumed that it had stood a great number of years after 

 it had attained maturity. (Literary Panorama for August, 1815; and Gent. 

 Mag. for October, 1817, p. 305.) The North wick Oak, Blockley, Worces- 

 tershire, which, when felled, was about 300 years old, had a girth, at 5 ft. 

 from the ground, of 21ft.; its smallest girth was 18ft.; height to the 

 branches, 30 ft. ; solid contents of the body, 234 ft. ; and of the arms, 200 ft. 

 (Gent. Mag., 1791, p. 612.) The oak which was felled in Withy Park, near 

 Wenlock in Shropshire, in 1697, spread 1 14 ft. : the trunk was 9 ft. in diameter, 

 exclusive of the bark. " It contained 24 cords of yard wood, 11J cords of 

 4ft. wood; 252 park pales 6 ft. long ; 1 load of cooper's wood; 6^ tons of 

 timber in the boughs ; 28 tons of timber in the body ; and all this besides fag- 

 gots, notwithstanding several boughs had dropped off in Mr. Wilde's father's 

 and grandfather's time. The stem was so wide, that two men could thrash on it 

 without striking each other. Several trees which grew at Cunsborough were 

 bought by a cooper at 101. per yard, for 9ft. or 10ft. high; and Ralph 

 Archdall felled a tree in Sheffield Park of 13 ft. diameter at the kerf; and 

 there was another, standing near the old ford, of 10 yards in compass." (Hunt. 

 Evcl., ii. p. 1 94.) In the hall in Goodrich Castle, Herefordshire, there is, says 

 Grose, a beam of oak, without a knot, 66 ft. long, and near 2 ft. square the 

 whole length. Evelyn mentions a large oaken plank, cut from a tree felled by 

 his grandfather's order, at Wootton, 5 ft. wide, 9 ft. 6 in. in length, and 6 in. 

 thick, all entire and clear ; and Dr. Plot notices a table in Dudley Castle hall, 

 already mentioned (p. 1777.), which was cut out of a tree which grew in the 

 park, all of one plank, above 75 ft. long, and 3 ft. wide throughout its whole 

 extent ; and which, being too long for the castle hall, 7 yards 9 in. were obliged 

 to be cut off. The mainmast of the Royal Sovereign, built in Charles I.'s time, 

 was 100ft. long, save one, and within 1 in. of a yard in thickness, all of one 

 piece of oak : several of the beams of the same ship were 44 ft. in length, 4 of 

 which were cut from an oak which grew in Framlingham, in Suffolk. Marcen- 

 nas states that the great ship called the Craven, which was built in France, had 

 its keel timbers 120 ft. long, and the mainmast 85 ft. high, and 12 ft. in diameter 

 at the base. An oak is mentioned as fallen in Sheffield Park, of so great a 

 girth, that, when the trunk lay flat on level ground, two men on horseback, on 

 opposite sides, could not see the crowns of each other's hats. Dr. Plot records 

 a similar circumstance as noticed of another immense oak at Newbury, which, 

 he says, was 15 yards in girth. The Lord's Oak, at Rivelin, was 12 yards 

 about, and the top yielded 21 cords of wood; its diameter, 3 yards 28 in. 

 The Lady Oak was 5 ft. square for 40 ft., contained 42 tons of timber, and 

 its boughs gave 25 cords of fuel ; and another, in the Hall Park, close by, gave 

 18 yards, without bough or knot; being 3ft. 6 in. square at top, and not much 

 bigger near the root. Arthur's round table must, as Gilpin observes, have 

 been cut from a tree of immense girth, as it measures, according to Grose, 

 18ft. in diameter. Now, this is 18ft. of solid heart wood ; and, if the depth of 

 sap wood, in which it must have been environed, be taken into the account, 

 we shall have the dimensions of a most enormous tree. Out of such oaks as 

 these must those ancient canoes, described by Sir Joseph Bankes as exhumed 



