THE WAVY-LEAVED OAK. 293 
said to comprehend the average duration of the 
monarch of our woodlands, when growing, un- 
disturbed under favourable conditions, there are 
recorded instances of Oaks which have lived be- 
yond a period of fifteen hundred years. 
Of our present woodland Oaks two are natives 
of Britain, and of these the most important is 
the one which forms the subject of this chapter. 
The generic name, Quercus, is compounded of 
two Celtic words, meaning ‘a fine Tree.’ 
The specific name, pedunculata, has been given 
to the present species on account of the circum- 
stance that the fruit or acorn is born upon a 
slender and delicate peduncle, the name given to 
the stalk or stem upon which the flower or fruit 
of plants is borne—the acorn stem in this species 
being oftentimes several inches in length. The 
fruit of the Oak to be next described is, on the 
contrary, generally entirely deprived of a stem, 
and being what is termed sessile—a word derived 
from the Latin sessilis, ‘ sitting’—because it 
‘sits’ without intermediate stalk upon its sup- 
port, the specific distinctive name of sessiliflora 
has been given to it. Whilst most botanists 
