308 



A DISCOURSE 



BOOK I. only of Fir and Pitch, but of very goodly Oaks, even to the lengtii of 

 one hundred feet, which were sold at fifteen pounds the tree, black and 

 hard as Ebony ; all their roots remaining in the soil, and in their natural 

 posture, with their bodies prostrate by them, pointing for the most part 

 north-east : And of such there seemed to be millions of all the usual spe- 

 cies natural to this country, sound and firm, Ash only excepted, which 

 were become so rotten and soft, as to be frequently cut through with the 

 spade only ; whereas Willows and other tender woods, continued very 

 sound and entire. Many of these subterranean- trees, of all sorts, were 

 found to have been cut and burnt down, squared and converted for 

 several uses, into boards, pales, stakes, piles, bars, &c. Some trees half- 

 riven, with the wedges sticking in them ; broken axe-heads, in shape of 

 sacrificing instruments, and frequently several coins of the Emperor 

 Vespasian, &c. There was, among others, one prodigious Oak of one 

 hundred and twenty feet in length, and twelve in diameter, ten feet in 

 the middle, and six at the small end ; so as, by computation, this mon- 

 ster must have been a great deal longer ; and for this tree Avas offered 

 twenty pounds. The truth and history of all this is so perfectly described 

 by Abr. de la Pryme, inserted among the transactions of the Royal 

 Society, ' that there needs no more to be said of it to evince that, not 



' " In many of these grounds, as well in England and Ireland, as in other parts of the 

 world, there are found vast numbers of trees standing with their stumps erect, and their 

 roots piercing the ground in a natural posture as when growing. Many of those trees are 

 broken or cut off near the roots, and lie along, and this usually in a north-east dii'ection. 

 People who have been willing to account for this, have usually resolved it into the eifect 

 of the deluge in the days of Noah ; but this is a very wild conjecture, and is proved false 

 by many unanswerable arguments. The waters of this deluge miglit indeed have washed 

 together a great number of trees, and buried them imder loads of earth ; but then they 

 would have lain irregularly and at random, whereas they all lie lengthwise from south- 

 west to north-east, and the roots all stand in their natural perpendicular posture, as close 

 as the roots of trees in a forest. Eeside, these trees are not all in their natural state, but 

 many of them have the evident marks of human workmanship upon them, some being cut 

 down with an axe, some split, and the wedges still remaining in them ; some burnt in dif- 

 ferent parts, and some bored through with holes. These things are also proved to be of a 

 later date than the deluge, by other matters found among them, such as utensils of ancient 

 people, and coins of the Roman Emperors. It appears from the whole, that all the trees 

 which we find in this fossile state, originally grew in the very places where we now find 

 them, and have only been thrown down and buried there, not brought from elsewhere. It 

 may appear indeed an objection to this opinion, that most of these fossile-trees are of the 



