Common Oak 325 



seat of Lord Walsingham, where the largest, now much decayed, is about 27 feet in 

 girth ; at BlickUng, where an oak in the kitchen garden 95 feet high, said by Grigor 

 to have been planted by the Earl of Buckinghamshire, has a straight clean trunk 

 32 feet high and 15^ in girth ; and at Stratton Strawless, where there is a beautiful 

 straight-stemmed oak close to the house clean to 40 feet high and over 10 in girth. 



Cowthorpe Oak. — No oak in England has probably been the subject of so much 

 writing as the Cowthorpe Oak, near Wetherby, which perhaps never was such a great 

 tree as has been supposed, and is now a mere wreck. It has been figured several 

 times, so that I need only refer those who wish to know more of it to a paper with 

 illustrations by Mr. John Clayton, published in the Transactions of the Botanical 

 Society of Edinburgh, 1903, p. 396. A comparison of the various measurements 

 taken at different times shows great discrepancies. Mr. Clayton attempts to prove 

 by a diagram that the decay of its roots have allowed it to settle into the ground, 

 and thus explains the diminution in its girth, but the discrepancy between measure- 

 ments taken by different people is considerable. The girth at 5 feet given by 

 Marsham as 36^ feet in 1768, when no hollow or cavity is mentioned as existing in 

 the tree, and the girth given by Mr. Clayton of 36 feet 10^ inches, at 5 feet 3 inches 

 in 1893, are so nearly identical that I do not think Mr. Clayton proves his argument. 

 Whether trees ever subside owing to the decay of their roots is to me a very 

 doubtful point, and I have certainly seen oaks felled which, though of great age 

 and completely hollow, were supported in their original position by a mere shell. 

 I visited the Cowthorpe Oak in July 1906, and found that in its present condition 

 no accurate measurement of it could be taken, a large part of one side having fallen 

 in. I could see no evidence to support Mr. Clayton's idea that the base of the tree 

 had sunk into the ground. The few living branches still bear acorns, from which 

 some seedlings were raised in 1905 by Messrs. Kent and Brydon, nurserymen of 

 Darlington. 



The finest oaks in Yorkshire that I have seen or heard of are in the park at 

 Studley Royal, which were described and figured by Loudon from drawings which I 

 have seen in the Marquess of Ripon's library. Though I could not identify the draw- 

 ings with trees now standing, Loudon gives the dimensions of the largest pedunculate 

 tree as 80 feet by 24 feet 4 inches, and the largest sessile oak, which he says was 

 then the largest in England, as 118 feet by 33!- feet. The best that were shown me 

 were a pedunculate oak 80 feet by 23 feet, a good deal past its prime, and a sessile oak 

 which I made 114 feet by 12 feet 2 inches, a vigorous and healthy tree. 



One of the most remarkable oaks in England on account of its shape is the 

 Umbrella Oak at Castlehill, North Devon (Plate 97). This tree had not altered 

 materially during the recollection of the late Earl Fortescue, who lived to be over 

 eighty, though it does not give the impression of very great age. It grows on a 

 slope called Eggesford Bank, near the house, and has a clean bole about S feet by 

 6 feet 8 inches. The branches spread horizontally from one point, and form a close 

 flat surface, of which the twigs are interlaced, and spread to a diameter of about 

 25 yards. Seedlings have been raised from its acorns, which do not produce 

 this very curious habit, and attempts to reproduce it by grafts have not succeeded. 



