Common Oak 3 1 7 



I visited it in March 1904, and, though the weather was dull, Mr. Foster was 

 able to secure some excellent photographs, of which I reproduce the following : — 



Plate 89 represents the Beggar's Oak, which has been well figured by Strutt 

 in his plate No. 2, and though eighty years have elapsed since that picture was 

 taken, a comparison with my plate shows that very little change has taken place in 

 the tree — thanks to the care with which it has been treated by successive owners, 

 who have worthily kept up the spirit described by Strutt in his account of this tree. 

 It now measures, as nearly as I could estimate, 62 feet high, with a bole 

 of about ;i;^ feet long, and a girth of 24 feet. The roots measure 25 paces round, 

 and the branches cover an area of 114 paces round (according to Lord Bagot's 

 measurement 7850 square feet). It is one of the finest and best-preserved oaks of its 

 type that I know, for though the Major Oak in Sherwood Forest (Plate 95) is bigger, 

 it is not nearly so sound ; and the Bourton Oak (Plate 93), which is taller and 

 in better condition, is not so large in girth or so spreading at the base. 



Another very fine tree in this park is the Squitch Bank Oak, also figured by 

 Strutt (Plate 34), who gives its measurements as follows: — height, 61 feet; girth, 

 21 feet 9 inches; contents, 1012 feet. When I saw it in 1905 its top was dead, and 

 the butt seemed to be decaying at the base internally. I measured it as about 60 feet 

 by 24 feet 10 inches, so that it has increased three feet in girth in eighty years. 

 The Beggar's Oak, in the same time, has increased rather more, but in measuring 

 the girth of such trees as this a few inches higher or lower will often make a great 

 difference, and therefore these rates of increase cannot be considered exact. 



Other great trees in this park mentioned by Strutt were the Rakeswood Oak, the 

 Long Coppice Oak, and the twisted oak on the Squitch Bank, which, though I 

 did not see them, still survive. In the Horsepool grove are a number of younger 

 but very tall and straight trees, which have been grown close together, and which 

 Lord Bagot's old woodman, W. Jackson (now dead), said he "could remember 

 so thick that you could hardly swing an axe amongst them." Of these, one, which 

 was called Lord Bagot's Walking-Stick, is the straightest and cleanest oak I ever 

 saw in England, though recently struck by lightning ; another was 95 feet by 

 8 feet 6 inches, with a clean stem 65 feet high. On the other side of the park, 

 at the west end of the grove called the Cliffs, are a number of splendid trees of great 

 size. Two of them, standing near each other, are figured in Plate 90. Of these, 

 the one in the foreground measures about 112 feet by 16 feet 8 inches, with a bole 

 35 feet high and four great erect limbs. The other, about the same height and a 

 foot less in girth, has a clean bole 45 feet high. One hundred pounds was offered 

 and refused for it. In the same grove, farther east, is an oak with a bole about 

 40 feet by 15 feet 3 inches, twisted from right to left, and another called the 

 King Oak, which, though now partly hollow, has been perhaps the finest timber oak 

 in the park (Plate 91). It is now about 100 feet high, but has been taller, as the 

 topmost branches are dead, with a straight clean bole 2 1 feet 3 inches in girth, and 

 must have contained over 1000 feet of timber. It is stated^ that in 181 2 .;^200 was 

 offered for the first length of this tree, estimated at 1 2s. per foot, and ^^93 for the 



' Gard. Chron, xvi. 230 (18S1). 



