Further Notices respecting British Oaks. 571 



Art. VI. Further Notices respecting British Oaks, and some Re- 

 marks on the Turkey Oak and Scarlet Oak ; extracted from various 

 Communications received from the Rev. W. T. Bree: ijoith a Note 

 on the Study of Oaks, and of Trees generally, by the Conductor. 



I NOW send you a formidable phalanx of the long-promised 

 specimens of Quercus sessiliflora ; almost all of them from my 

 own wood here, and all from this parish, or the adjoining one of 

 Corley. When you examine them, I am apprehensive yoxx will 

 feel inclined to come to the conclusion, that our two so called 

 species of oak are mere varieties ; but I pray you not to be too 

 hasty in coming to this opinion ; for, though there are sessile oaks 

 bearing fruit on peduncles, and roburs bearing almost sessile 

 fruit, there is yet a certain undescribable something about them, 

 by means of which I can always distinguish each, without mi- 

 nutely examining either the acorns or leafstalks. This you may, 

 perhaps, think a very silly remark for a botanist ; but that I can- 

 not help. Your theory (as stated in a note of Oct. 21.), that 

 Q. sessiliflora always assumes a conical shape, and i?obur a glo- 

 bose one, will not hold at all, at least not with our Warwickshire 

 trees. I can see no difference in this respect ; one is as globose 

 as the other : indeed, the general outline of the two trees ap- 

 pears to me precisely the same. One circumstance I have ob- 

 served this season (and it is very stupid in me not to have 

 observed it before): viz. that the young seedlings of Q. sessiliflora 

 bear their leaves close to the stem, not on footstalks ; so that in 

 this stage they are hardly to be distinguished from Q. i?6bur. 

 At what period they begin to assume footstalks to the leaves, I 

 cannot say ; but I perceive that trees of 2 ft. or 3 ft. high, of my 

 own sowing, have assumed that character. Q. sessiliflora ge- 

 nerally bears small acorns (as you have remarked) ; but you will 

 find, by the specimens now sent, that it sometimes produces very 

 fine large ones. There is a peculiarity, too, in the colour of the 

 acorns when ripe : they have very generally a red or pinkish 

 tinge ; so that, in nine cases out of ten, I think I could distinguish 

 one sort from the other by looking at the fallen acorns only, 

 Dec, 5. 1835. 



A neighbour of mine, a professional gentleman, who is, or, at 

 least, used to be, much employed in purchasing timber for the 

 Grand Junction Company, informs me that oak timber from 

 this neighbourhood weighs three pounds in the cubic foot 

 heavier than oak from Buckinghamshire. This is a curious 

 fact,if fact it is. It just occurs to me, that you will find some 

 remarks of mine on Q. sessiliflora in the Magazine of Natural 

 Historij^ iii. 165. [These remarks are as follows; and we recom- 

 mend the reader to contrast them with those of Mr. Atkinson, 

 given in this Magazine, in vol. xi. p. 83.] 



