88 



THE OAK. 



than is ever remembered, revived its drooping 

 powers, and it bore two or three pecks. There 

 is not any danger," Mr. Dale says, "of the race 

 of the present Royal Oak becoming extinct, 

 it having already double as many authenticated 

 descendants as King Priam had. I was myself 

 the tutor of some scores of them in the year 

 1834-5, and have got several of them good appoint- 

 ments at the seats of Lord Dungannon, in Den- 

 bighshire, Sir Astley Cooper, in Hertfordshire, 

 &c. More than thirty young plants, the produce 

 of 1834, were this year planted upon the glebe 

 at Albrighton, and a plentiful crop has been 

 reared from the acorns of 1844. The largest known 

 descendant of the present Royal Oak was planted* 



* The inscription attached to the present tree by the proprietor of 

 the Boscohel estate, Miss Evans, is as follows : 

 Felicissimam arborem, 

 quam in asylum potentissimi Regis Caroli II. 

 Deus Optimus Maximus per quern reges regnant 

 hie crescere voluit, 

 tarn in perpetuam rei tanta? memoriam, 

 quam in specimen firmae in reges fidei, 

 miiro cinctam posteris commendarunt 

 Basilius et Jana Fitzherbert : 

 quod pietatis monimentum vetustate coUapsum 

 patemamm ^irtutum hseredes 

 et ayitffi in principes fidei Eemulatores 

 in integrum restituerunt 

 Basilius et Eliza Fitzherbert, 

 iiii Cal. Junii, A.S. MDCCLXXXVII. 

 Qua ex arbore banc arborem, uti fertur, ortam 

 ferreis his, quae hodie sunt, repagulis 

 circummimivit 

 ejusdem hujusce agri possessor, 

 eodemque erga reges animo praedita, 

 Francesca Evans, 

 A. D. MDC CCX VII. 



The tablet, bearing this inscription, was set up on the 2.5th Mav, 

 1845. 



