296 
OBSERVATIONS 
ON 
VEGETABLES. 
TREES, ORDER OF LOSING THEIR 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.* 
SIZE AND GROWTH. 
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 1 foot from the earth, 12 feet 6 inches 
in circumference, and at 14 feet (the half of the timber length) 
is 8 feet 2 inches. So if the bark was to be measured as timber, 
the tree gives 116 J 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 fax 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 
* Perhaps the weeping willow is the latest of all deciduous trees to shed its leaves, retaining its 
verdure sometimes even to December ; it is also one of the earliest in spring to push forth, 
though from the small size of its leaves it is generally a long while becoming green. Of this tree, 
we have at present only the female sex in this country; the male is more generally seen in Italy, 
which, at the time of blossoming, is extremely ornamental ; so much so, that 1 cannot but 
wonder that it has never been imported. — £d. 
