152 



LETTERS ON TREES. 



features of the Holly-and-chain piece (Fig. 22.) in 



my possession, which 

 we have often exa- 

 mined together, and 

 for which I am in- 

 debted to the kind- 

 ness of a friend.* It 

 reveals several par- 

 ticulars of interest in 

 relation to the habi- 

 tudes of the woody tissue. The piece itself is a 

 block from the trunk of a Holly-tree, within which a 

 portion of chain is more or less completely embedded. 

 The block had been cleft in twain after the tree was 

 felled. 



9. The history of it is briefly this : — The tree inchn- 

 ing, when alive and young, too far on one side, a chain 

 was placed around it and firmly secured behind. In 

 process of time, as the tree grew and became thicker 

 — the chain being unyielding, and the pressure against 

 this from within augmenting — the old bark gave way 

 under the chain, and the woody fibres developed from 

 the Cambium-layer grew over and enclosed it. By 

 the growth-in-situ theory, the woody matter should 

 merely have pushed out on either side of the chain — 

 and as well below as above — and so forming an open 

 gutter have left it lying there. But instead of this, 



* Alexander Hojes, Esq. of Bitterne-Grove, near Southampton. 



