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is a mystery. They are beautiful and wholesome trees, 

 and are easily cultivated. The red oak is a compara- 

 tively rapid growing tree, and so are the black, scarlet 

 and pin oaks. Wherever they have been planted they 

 have invariably proved satisfactory. 



The white oak is undoubtedly our most venerable tree. 

 It is not, however, a rapid grower even in its youth. 

 Emerson, after many careful comparisons, places the rate 

 of growth of the white oak as one inch in diameter in five 

 years after the tree is forty years old, with a somewhat 

 greater increase before reaching that age. The largest 

 white oak which I have known in the county, is in 

 a pasture some distance in the rear of Mr. David 

 Pingree's house in Topsfield. Measured in 1875 and 

 again in 1890, the gain in circumference at five feet 

 from the ground was eight inches. The tree was thir- 

 teen feet and seven inches in circumference, at five feet 

 above the ground, when last measured. 



Working with these figures, and making a proper 

 allowance for a more rapid growth during the first fifty 

 years of its life, the tree is made out to be two hundred 

 and eighty-two years old. Taking Emerson's estimate 

 and applying his rule for white oaks to this tree, it 

 would be two hundred and fifty-eight years old. This 

 last estimate may be the most nearly connect, for the 

 difierence in circumference in the measurements of this 

 tree only shows its growth in extreme old age and is 

 less, without doubt, than during any similar period of 

 its life. 



Averaging these figures, the tree would be two hun- 

 dred and seventy years old in 1890, the fairest estimate 

 of its age with available data. In this case the acorn 

 from which this tree has grown germinated the very 



