36 THE OAK. 



" 'Twas put up about twenty or thirty years ago ; but 

 the place deserved a better memorial. I have writ it in 

 such lines as they have cut it, and as the letters now 

 stand ; a few years will ruine both the wall and the in- 

 scription. 



" The emblematical medal my good friend alludes to is 

 the XLVii. in Mr. Evelyn's N"umismata, which King Charles 

 caused to be stamped in honour of the installation of his 

 son ; whereupon is the Royal Oak under a prince's coronet, 

 over-spreading subnascent trees and young suckers." 



In the year 1812, or thereabouts, and before he was 

 aware of Mr. Plaxton's notice, Mr. Dale discovered por- 

 tions of the above inscription " on a blue stone, in letters 

 of gold," among the long and neglected grass on the 

 Mount in Boscobel Garden. After spending some time 

 in arranging the fragments, he communicated the discovery 

 to the occupants of the house, who appear to have taken 

 little interest in the relic. The house and grounds have 

 passed into other hands, and the fragments of the stone in 

 all probability lie buried beneath the present garden walks, 

 which were laid out by the present proprietor after the 

 pattern of those which existed in the time of Charles II. 

 Of the tree itself very few, and these imperfect, records 

 remain. Old Plaxton speaks of it as "a fair spreading 

 tree, the boughs of it all lined and covered with ivy," and 

 that in the thick of it the King and Carlos sat. This 

 agrees well with the description of it which the King him- 

 self gives in his narrative, " A great Oak that had been 

 lopped some three or four years before, and, being grown 

 out again very bushy and thick, could not be seen through ; 

 and here we staid all the day." This would be an excellent 

 hiding-place ; for, says Mr. Dale, " I have frequently ob- 

 served that an old Pollard Oak, standing on a bank and 

 overhanging the road between the churches of Albrighton 

 and Donington, about one hundred yards from each, 

 would afford a secure retreat for two or three persons from 

 the observation of all passers-by." 



