THE HAWTHORN. 



221 



in a high degree, patriarchal. Participating in the 

 general interest felt with reference to this object, 

 we deemed it advisable to apply for information 

 regarding it to the proprietor, to whom we are 

 indebted for the following remarks, w^hich we 

 take the liberty of here introducing : — As to the 

 Hethel Thorn, ^ I wish,' he says, ^my story were 

 a clearer one, and should be very glad if autho- 

 rities and traditions could be better collected. I 

 have heard that the first Sir Thomas Beevor said, 

 that he was in possession of a deed bearing date 

 early in the thirteenth century, in which, refer- 

 ring to it as a boundary tree, it is mentioned as 

 the Old Thorn. But I have innumerable deeds 

 from the court-rolls of the manor of Hethel, but 

 none of them earlier than the time of Edward 

 III., and amongst them I can find no such men- 

 tion. If, therefore. Sir Thomas had such deed, 

 he must have taken it out, and kept it as a curi- 

 osity. I have also heard that in one of the 

 chronicles the Thorn was mentioned as the mark 

 for meeting, in an insurrection of the peasants in 

 the reign of King John ; but I have never been 

 able to get a reference to what chronicle. The 

 first Sir Thomas Beevor put a rail round it, and 

 took great care of it. After the present Sir 

 Thomas Beevor left Hethel, it was much ne- 

 glected : and pieces of it, I am told, were pulled 

 down by the cottagers. I replaced the railing, 

 and had some of the branches, which had been 

 supported by crooks by Sir Thomas, again so 

 propped. Not only the bark of the hollow tree 

 is as hard and as heavy as iron, but every branch, 

 most curiously inter-involved, is a hollow tube, 

 into which you may put your arm, all the interior 



