COMMON ASH. 85 



The Ash, whether considered in reference to the valuable 

 qualities of its wood, or the claim it has to the title of 

 a noble and ornamental forest-tree, must always form a 

 prominent feature in a British Sylva. In point of magni- 

 tude it ranks as a tree of the first class, and though it 

 may yield in circumference and vastness of trunk to some 

 of our ancient oaks, yet this, — the Venus, as it has been 

 called, of the forest, — frequently towers in height above the 

 Herculean monarch of the woods. Of the dimensions 

 of the most celebrated trees of this species an extensive 

 list is given in the " Arboretum Britannicum,"' 1 containing 

 not only those extracted from the most authentic authors, 

 such as Lauder's " Gilpin," Stratus " Sylva Britannica," 

 &c, but also an additional number from return papers sent 

 to the author of the first-named work. In this list we find 

 several Ash trees, from twenty to thirty feet in circum- 

 ference, with a height varying from seventy to ninety, 

 and even one hundred feet. The great Woburn Ash is 

 ninety feet high, twenty-three feet and a half in circum- 

 ference at the ground, with a clean stem of twenty-eight 

 feet ; this tree contains eight hundred and seventy-two feet 

 of solid timber. In Wiltshire there are many trees with 

 clean stems of fifty feet and from nine to twelve feet in 

 girth. In Scotland, the great Ash at Carnock, in Stirling- 

 shire, is ninety feet high, the circumference at the ground 

 thirty-one feet ; the solid contents are six hundred and 

 seventy-nine cubic feet ; this tree is now upwards of two 

 hundred and forty years old, having been planted about 

 1596. In the neighbourhood of Morpeth, Northumberland, 

 where the Ash grows very luxuriantly, there are many 

 fine and highly-ornamental trees ; among them is the Cow- 

 pen Ash, figured as a sub- variety in the " Arboretum 

 Britannicum,' 1 '' — a tree that, from the elegance of its growth, 



