252 corylace^:. 



contents of the portion recovered contained five hundred 

 and forty- five cubic feet, although the whole of the sap 

 wood had perished. 



The timber was perfectly sound, and the tree, by what- 

 ever accident it had been overthrown, had fallen in the 

 vigour of its growth. When sawn up, the interior planks 

 were found of a deep rich brown colour ; those nearer the 

 exterior darker, or approaching to black. A variety of 

 elegant furniture has been made from the wood, but it 

 has been found necessary for fine cabinet-work to have 

 it cut into veneers, as, when worked in bulk, it is apt 

 to crack and become warped. The remains of other large 

 Oaks have also been met with upon the banks of the Tyne, 

 the Alne, and other rivers, as well as in various bogs and 

 morasses, and we mention these instances to show in a 

 district where, at the present day, nothing but recently- 

 planted Oak, or dwarfish timber from stock shoots exists, 

 that in former times the monarch of the forest grew luxu- 

 riantly and attained a splendid developement, and also 

 as an inducement to the planter not to neglect the liberal 

 insertion of this national tree wherever soil and situation 

 are found congenial to its growth. In other parts of Eng- 

 land the Oak still grows in all its native magnificence of 

 form and dimensions, and the remains of those ancient 

 forests which are chronicled by our earliest writers, and 

 which, in the time of our Saxon ancestors, spread oyer 

 the greater portion of the country, are still to be traced 

 in the venerable but living relics of enormous Oaks, many 

 of which are supposed to number more than a thousand 

 years. 



To give a detailed account, or even to enumerate all 

 the various Oaks remarkable for their size and other pe- 

 culiarities, which have existed or do still exist, would 



