298 OBSERVATIONS ON VEGETABLES. 
OBSERYATIONS ON VEGETABLES. 
« 
TEEES, ORDEE OF LOSING THEIE LEAVES. 
One of the first trees that becomes naked is the walnut ; the 
mulberry, the ash, especially if it bears many keys, and the horse- 
chestnut come next. All lopped trees, while their heads are young, 
carry their leaves a long while. Apple-trees and peaches remain green 
very late, often till the end of November : young beeches never cast 
their leaves till spring, till the new leaves sprout and push them off ; in 
the autumn the beechen-leaves turn of a deep chestnut colour. Tall 
beeches cast their leaves about the end of October. — "White. 
SIZE AND GEOWTH. 
Mr. Marsham * of Stratton, near Norwich, informs me by letter thus : 
"I became a planter early; so that an oak which I planted in 1720 is 
become now, at one foot from the earth, twelve feet six inches in 
circumference, and at fourteen feet (the half of the timber length) is 
eight feet two inches. So if the bark was to be measured as timber, 
the tree gives 116^ feet, buyer's measure. Perhaps you never heard of" 
a larger oak while the planter was living. I flatter myself that I 
increased the growth by washing the stem, and digging a circle as far 
as I supposed the roots to extend, and by spreading sawdust, &c., as 
related in the Phil. Trans. I wish I had begun with beeches (my 
favourite trees as well as yours), I might then have seen very large 
trees of my own raising. But I did not begin with beech till 1741, and 
then by seed ; so that my largest is now at five feet from the ground, 
six feet three inches in girth, and with its head spreads a circle of 
twenty yards diameter. This tree was also dug round, washed, &c." 
Stratton, 2Uli July, 1790. 
The circumference of trees planted by myself at one foot from the 
ground (1790). 
Oak in 1730 
Ash 1730 
Great fir 1751 
Greatest beech 1751 
Elm 1750 
Lime 1756 
, 4 ft. 5 m. 
• • • • « 4. ^2 
. 5 0 
. -. 4 0 
. 5 3 
• • • ..55 
The great oak in the Holt, which is deemed by Mr. Marsham to be 
the biggest in this island, at seven feet from the ground, measures in 
circumference thirty-four feet. It has in old times lost several of its 
* Eobert Marsham, of Stratten Lawless, a country gentleman, contributed 
several papers to the "Philosophical Transactions," chiefly observations upon trees 
' and vegetation. He was also the acquaiatance of Stillingfleet. 
1 
