444 THE BOOK OF THE LANDED ESTATE. 



in the Crystal Palace, Sydenham. When it was erected in its natural 

 position, it was one hundred and sixteen feet high, forty-five feet in cir- 

 cumference at the top, and ninety-three feet in circumference at the 

 base. This specimen, however, it is greatly to he regretted, was de- 

 stroyed in the fire which took place at the Palace in 1867. 



Mr Lapham, the proprietor of the Calaveros or Mammoth Tree 

 Grove, gives an interesting account of the dimensions of the trees in that 

 grove. He says : " Most of the specimens now standing there are of 

 the average height of three hundred feet ; one, however, the ' Father of 

 the Forest,' as the specimen has been called, must have been consider- 

 ably larger. It has long since bowed its head in the dust, and now ' lies 

 at random carelessly diffused.' It still measures one hundred and 

 twelve feet in circumference at the base, and can be examined for three 

 hundred feet where the trunk was broken by falling against another tree : 

 it there measures eighteen feet in diameter, and, according to the average 

 taper of the other trees, this giant must have been four hundred and 

 fifty feet high, and was no doubt one of the loftiest forms of vegetable 

 matter of the present creation. A hollow burnt cavity extends through 

 the trunk for two hundred feet, large enough for a person to ride through."* 

 Others are mentioned on the same authority as the " Miner's Cabin," 

 measuring eighty feet in circumference and three hundred feet in height ; 

 the " Old Bachelor," a forlorn-looking individual, sixty feet in circum- 

 ference and three hundred feet high ; " Hercules," sixty-seven feet in 

 circumference and three hundred and twenty-five feet high. The 

 geological formation of the district of California in which the Mam- 

 moth Grove is found is granite. Dr Winslow states, in the ' Cali- 

 fornian Farmer ' (see ' Pinetum Britannicum '), that " the basin is 

 reeking with moisture, and in the lowest places the water is stand- 

 ing, and some of the largest trees dip their roots into the pools or 

 water-runs. The soil in which they grow is rich and deep, and if com- 

 posed, as it probably is, of the decayed remains of former giants of the 

 same tribe, it is no wonder that it is so. The climate at the Calaveros 

 Grove is good neither very hot nor very cold and not dissimilar to 

 our own." 



The Wellington/id has proved itself perfectly hardy in the climate of 

 this country, and indeed this might have been expected from the de- 

 scription which is given of the climate of the different parts in which 

 it is found growing naturally. It remained free of injury in the severe 

 winter of 1860-61. It is a rapid grower in our climate, but we cannot 

 say much of its uses so far. It is thought by some that the bark will 

 be valuable for tanning. There is a fine plant of it at Windsor, which 



* ' Pinetum Britaunicum,' part xx. p. 7. 



