FORESTRY BUREAU. 



153 



young ones are still growing up, which in time may be joined to the old 

 body. 



Evelyn spoke of it as standing in the reign of Stephen, so that we 

 may accept 57 feyet as the maximum measurement. Now, a chestnut 

 may attain 17 feet in its first century; for instance, the one at Nettle- 

 combe. If, therefore, 15 feet be taken for the first century, then, on the 

 principle of the third as the average, it would require eleven centuries 

 for 57 feet; but this may be too low, for in 70 years it increased 2 feet 

 in girth, and instead of eleven it may not have required but seveu cen- 

 turies when Sir Eobert Atkyns declared it to be 57 feet. 



The famous Castanea di Ceutobaville, on Mount iEtna, has a similar 

 history. It is said that the Queen of Aragon and one hundred follow- 

 ers took shelter beneath it from a shower of rain. Brydone measured 

 it in 1790 and found it to be 204 feet in circumference, but it was a 

 question with him whether it was one tree or many. Murray's guide- 

 book speaks of it as separate trees. 



The Castanea del Nave is rather larger than the Tartworth. The rich 

 soil has much to do with the growth, and it is impossible to conjecture 

 whether they are five or ten centuries. The rate of growth is apt to be 

 underrated when a tree meets with favorable conditions. 



The silver fir was only introduced into England in the seventeenth 

 century, by Serjeant Newdigate. One tree of his planting was measured 

 by Evelyn eighty-one years afterward, and was found to be 13 feet in 

 circumference. 



A comparison of the statistics of growths, with reference to oaks, in- 

 dicates a more rapid rate than is generally supposed. 



It may be well to notice some of the oldest Limes. The Swiss very 

 often commemorate a victory by planting a lime tree, so that it may be 

 true that the lime standing in the square at Freyburg was planted on the 

 day of their victory over Charles the Bold at Marat in 1476. It is said 

 that a youth bore it as a twig into the town, and arriving breathless 

 and exhausted from the battle, only had strength to utter the word 

 " victory," and fell dead. But this tree was only 13 feet 9 inches in 

 1831, three hundred and fifty-five years after planting. 



The large lime at Neustadt, in TV iirtemberg, mentioned by Evelyn 

 as having its boughs supported by columns of stone, was 27 feet when 

 he wrote (1064), and in 1837 it was 54 feet, so that within a period of 

 one hundred and seventy-three years it had gained 27 feet, consequently 

 it is fair to presume that two hundred years was more than enough for 

 it to have attained 27 feet. No English lime appears to have reached 

 such dimensions, though the one at Depeham, near Norwich, was 46 feet 

 when Sir Thomas Browne sent his account of it to Evelyn, which ex- 

 ploded the legend that all limes in this country came from two plants 

 brought over by Sir John Spelman, who introduced the manufacture of 

 paper in England. 



It is natural to expect the greatest longevity in trees indigenous to 

 any climate, though it has been disputed. Tradition, however, does 

 not always give satisfaction in estimating the longevity of trees. 

 Tacitus calculated that a fig tree was eight hundred and forty years 

 old because tradition marked it as the one under which the wolf nursed 

 Romulus and Remus. 



As to whether our oldest trees are susceptible of an increased rate of 

 growth by the application of fresh earth around the roots has not been 

 sufficiently tried. 



Thomas Meehan, who made a tour of investigation to California and 

 as far north as Alaska, said at the Academy of Natural Science : " There 



