76 



THE OAK. 



burning till morning. This untoward accident so 

 weakened it, that, as Professor Burnet informs 

 us, the high winds of February, 1820, stretched 

 this forest patriarch on the ground, after having 

 endured the storms of perhaps one thousand win- 

 ters. Its remains were purchased by a builder ; 

 and from a portion thereof the pulpit and read- 

 ing-desk in the new church, St. Pancras, were 

 constructed : they are beautiful specimens of Bri- 

 tish Oak, and will long preserve the recollection 

 of this memorable tree." The largest Oak on 

 record grew in Dorsetshire. It was called Da- 

 mory's Oak, and was used as an ale-house. It 

 was sixty-eight feet in circumference, and the 

 room formed in it was sixteen feet in length. 

 This tree was blown down in 1703. 



The celebrated Chapel-Oak of AUonville in the 

 Pays de Caux, in France, which is still standing, 

 measures at its base thirty-five feet in circum- 

 ference, and at six feet above the level of the 

 ground it is twenty -six feet in girth. It is hol- 

 low, and the interior is fitted up as a chapel. 

 This transformation was effected in 1696. The 

 computed age of the tree is between eight and 

 nine centuries. 



The largest Oak now existing, of which I can 

 find any account, is the Cowthorpe Oak, near 

 Wetherby in Yorkshire. ?)f this tree a spirited 

 engraving is given in Hunter's Evelyn's Sylva,* 

 together with the following description. With- 

 in three feet of the surface it measures sixteen 

 yards in circumference, and close by the ground, 

 twenty-six yards. Its height is about eighty feet, 

 and its principal limb extends sixteen yards from 



* Vol. ii. p. 197. 



