152 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE. 



The Hon. James J. Wilson, of Bethel, Vt., an old lawyer and late 

 senator in the State legislature, gives a case which occurred in the 

 courts where it was decided that " the rings were not a sure indication 

 of the age of a tree." That distinct concentric rings approximate, and 

 in some cases agree in number with the years of a tree, no one will 

 deny; but that intermediate or subrings, less conspicuous, exist, is 

 equally true. 



These sub or additional rings are easily accounted for by sudden and 

 more or less frequent changes of weather, long intervals of extreme 

 drought or cold. 



Query: Has a tree grown in a conservatory or place of unchanged 

 conditions of heat and moisture any concentric rings ? 



Thomas Meehan, editor Gardener's Monthly, in relation to annual 

 rings, says : 



Northern trees, all hard wood, make many rings a year, sometimes a dozen, but the 

 last set of cells in the annual growth are very small and the first very large, so it is 

 an easy matter to determine the annual growth. 



J. A. Farrar presents an elaborate paper in Longman's Magazine on 

 the "Age of trees." In speaking of the attainable age of the cypress 

 and its introduction in England, he says : 



It is first mentioned in "Turne's Names of Herbs," published in 1548, which makes 

 it probable that it was introduced in England before the beginning of that century. 



The cypress at Fulham, which in 1793 was 2 feet 5 inches at 3 feet 

 above ground, could not have been planted before 1674, the year that 

 Compton the Great, the introducer of foreign trees in Eng'land, became 

 bishop of London ; that gives a growth of about 2 feet the first one 

 hundred years. 



The cypress planted by Michael Angelo, at Chartreux, was 13 feet in 

 circumference in 1817, an average of over 4 feet the first three centuries 

 The cypress at Sonuna, for whose sake Napoleon bent the road so that 

 it should be spared, is not more than 23 feet in girth. The tradition 

 that this tree is coeval with Christianity may or may not be true, but 

 if 3 feet be taken as the first century growth, and take the third as the 

 average, it was evidently standing at the time of Caesar, as the old 

 chronicle at Milan attests. 



The Lebanon cedar, first planted at Lambeth in 1683, was 7 feet 9 

 inches in girth one hundred and ten years later. Dr. Uvedale's cedar 

 at Enfield, planted in 1670, was 15 feet 8 inches in 1835, one hundred 

 and sixty-five years after it was planted. The large cedar at Uxbridge, 

 which was blown down in 1790, was one hundred and eighteen years 

 old. When Gilpin measured it in 1776 it was 15 J feet. In 1696, Maun- 

 drell, the traveler, measured one of the largest cedars on Mount Leb- 

 anon, supposed to have been growing there in the days of Solomon, 

 and found it to be 36 feet 6 inches. Four feet being the average rate a 

 century, this tree could have attained its size in nine centuries, and may 

 not have been older than the time of Charlemagne, and may have been 

 much younger, allowing for the rapid growth on a site where it is indig- 

 enous. 



The Fortworth Spanish chestnut in Gloucestershire is said to be the 

 oldest tree in England. It bears an inscription to the effect that King 

 John held a Parliament beneath it. Sir Robert Atkyns, whose history 

 of that country was published in 1712, speaks of it as said by tradition 

 to have been growing in the reign of King John. It is 57 feet in cir- 

 cumference and seems to be several trees incorporated together, and 



