184 Gilpin's foeest soeneey. 



take a sweeping line, and to be broken, also, witli 

 stumps or decayed branches. 



Close by the gate of the water-walk, at 

 Magdalen College in Oxford, grew an Oak, which 

 perhaps stood there a sapling, when Alfred the 

 Great founded the university. Tliis period only 

 includes a space of nine hundred years, which is 

 no great age for an Oak. It is a difficult matter, 

 indeed, to ascertain the age of a tree.* The age of 

 a castle or abbey is the object of history. Even a 

 common house is recorded by the family that built 

 it. All these objects arrive at maturity in their 

 youth, if I may so speak. But the tree, gradually 

 completing its growth, is not worth recording in 

 the early part of its existence. It is then only a 

 common tree, and, afterwards, when it becomes 

 remarkable for its age, the memory of its youth 

 is forgotten. This tree, however, can almost pro- 

 duce historical evidence for the ag'e it boasts. 



* In. most exogenous trees, or those ■which, increase by addi- 

 tions of tissue outwards from the central column or pith, a very- 

 near approximation to tlieir age may be obtained by counting 

 the conoontrio ' rings ' shown on the trunk, though only, of 

 course, when the latter is cut across — each ' ring ' representing 

 the tissue added during one year's growth. — Ed. 



