AMONG THE OAKS 89 
spread their arms abroad, and still to stand long 
after their maturity, when their usefulness and 
their greatest profit as timber trees are already 
on the wane. 
The oak has played a far more important part 
in English history than any other tree. Oaks 
were objects of worship among the aboriginal 
Celts and Britons; they were the sacred trees 
beneath whose boughs the ancient Druids per- 
formed their mystic rites. Of such an oak 
Spenser says in his Shepherd’s Calendar— 
‘ For it had been an ancient tree, 
Sacred with many a mystery.’ 
It was beneath the spreading branches of oaks 
that the Folkmote was at one time held. They 
were often historical landmarks, known for cen- 
turies as fixing the boundaries of parishes and 
shires. At the time of the Conquest they were 
principally valued, like the beech, for the mast 
they yielded as pannage for hogs and swine, and 
as toothsome food for the king’s deer. Later on, 
however, throughout the whole of the early period 
of the naval development of Britain, the oak was 
by far the most important among timber trees. 
