78 



THE OAK. 



Oak is confessed to have been the prototype, viz., 

 Smeaton's Eddystone light-house. Sections of 

 the trunk of the one would, at several heights, 

 nearly correspond with sections of the curved and 

 cylindrical portions of the shaft of the other. 

 Arthur's round table would form an entire roof, 

 or projecting capital, for the lighthouse : indeed, 

 upon this table might be built a round church 

 as large as that of St. Lawrence, in the Isle of 

 Wight, and space to spare ; so that, if the extent 

 of the sap-wood be added, or the ground-plot of 

 the Cowthorpe Oak be substituted for Arthur's 

 table, there w^ould be plenty of room, not only to 

 build such a parish church, but to allow space for 

 a small cemetery beside it. Indeed," continued 

 Burnet, I w^ould merely observe that St. Bar- 

 tholomew's, in the hamlet of Kingsland, between 

 London and Hackney, which, beside the ordinary 

 furniture of a place of religious worship, has pews 

 and seats for one hundred and twenty persons, is 

 nearly nine feet less in width, and only seventeen 

 inches more in length, than the ground-plot of 

 the Cowthorpe Oak. In fact, the tree occupies 

 upwards of thirty square feet more than does the 

 chapel." 



The following affecting story is told by White : 

 — In the centre of Josel's wood there formerly 

 stood an Oak, which, though stately and tall on 

 the whole, bulged out into a large excrescence 

 about the middle of the stem. On this a pair of 

 ravens had fixed their residence for such a series 

 of years that the Oak was distinguished by the 

 title of the Raven Tree. Many were the attempts 

 of the neighbouring youths to get at this eyry ; 

 the difficulty whetted their inclinations, and each 



