1794 



ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III, 



remarkably the case with the celebrated oak at Lord Cowper's [shown in^g. 

 14-80. in p. 1741.]. This tree, above a century ago, was well known as the 

 Great Oak at Pan- ^ ^ 1G36 



s hanger. There is 

 also a beautiful tree 

 (fig. 1636.), of the 

 same description, at 

 Lord Darnley's seat 

 at Cobham, which, 

 being protected from 

 the depredations of 

 cattle, enjoys the 

 most perfect free- 

 dom of growth, ex- 

 tending its latitude 

 of boughs in every 

 direction, and droop- 

 ing its clustered fo- 

 liage to the very 

 ground." (Strutt in 

 Mag. Nat. Hist., vol. 

 i. p. 42.) 



The Spray of the Oak has been described and illustrated by Gilpin, with his 

 usual felicity. " In the spray of trees," he remarks, " nature seems to observe 

 one simple principle ; which is, that the mode of growth in the spray corre- 

 sponds exactly with that of the larger branches, of which, indeed, the spray is 

 the origin. Thus, the oak divides his boughs from the 

 stem more horizontally than most other deciduous trees. 

 The spray makes exactly, in minia- 

 ture, the same appearance. It 

 breaks out in right angles, or in 

 angles that are nearly so, forming 

 its shoots commonly in short lines 

 [see figs. 1637. and 1638., from Gil- 

 pin; and/g. 1639., from Strutt]; 

 the second year's shoot usually 

 taking some direction contrary to 

 that of the first. Thus the ru- 

 diments are laid of that abrupt mode of ramification, for which the oak is 



1638 



1637 



