Strutt’s Delicie Sylvarum. 379 
era of Christianity ?” We can readily subscribe to this doc- 
trine; and feel, indeed, quite at a loss to set limits (under 
favourable cienmmerinee) to the natural duration of this mo- 
narch of the forest. 
A fine picturesque oak is perhaps the most beautiful object 
in nature. And here we would entreat all such as are so 
fortunate as to be the possessors of these ‘ venerable and 
living antiquities of nature,” not to mutilate their forms and 
destroy their character by cutting out as unsightly objects, 
the raunpikes, or rampikes as they are called, that is, the 
dead and denudated arms, that have endured the blast of 
ages, — a practice which we are sorry to see adopted in the 
parks of some of our nobility and gentry, and of which the 
example is set even in the royal domain at Windsor. The 
bold projecting limbs, now “ blasted with antiquity,” though 
no longer adorned with rich and verdant foliage, still add 
er eatly t to the grandeur and picturesque effect of the tree; they 
preserve the proper balance of the parts, which is conse- 
quently destroyed by their removal, and serve as memoran- 
dums of its pristine vigour, to define the original outline and 
extent of the whole; the imagination supplying to the mind 
what is no longer actually visible to the eye. We should as 
soon think of removing some ivy-mantled turret, or mouldering 
moss-grown buttress, from an ancient castellated ruin, with a 
view to improve its beauty, as of depriving our oaks of their 
raunpikes, and “ curtailing them of this fair proportion.” 
Delighting as we do in our “old patrician trees,” it is 
never without regret that we see the woodman exercising his 
craft upon them, or hear the sound of the axe echoing through 
the grove. The demands of the state, however, —the cupidity, 
the extr avagance, or, perhaps, the bad taste of landed proprie- 
tors,—the blasting and tempestuous elements,—or, lastly, the 
unsparing hand of time, —some or all of these are causes per- 
petually in operation to ravage the forests and despoil the 
country of its ornamental timber. It. is therefore with no 
ordinary satisfaction that we hail Mr. Strutt’s successful 
attempt to portray some of the choicest specimens of our 
forest scenery, and leave to after-ages a memorial of them, 
“ Quod nec Jovis ira, nec ignes, 
Nec poterit ferrum, nec edax abolere vetustas.” 
Mr. Strutt is already known to the public, not only as 
an elegant and accomplished scholar, the translator of Clau- 
ie “ Which, Jove’s rage, 
Nor fire, nor sword shall raze, nor eating age.” 
Ovid’s Met. (Sandys’s translation.) 
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