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LANDSCAPE GARDENING. 
it, with an oven, in which, according to the custom of I he 
country, they dried chestnuts, filberts, and other fruits, 
which they wished to preserve for winter use ; using as 
fuel, when they could find no other, pieces cut with a 
hatchet from the interior of the tree. In Brydone’s time, 
in 1770 , this tree measured two hundred and four feet in 
circumference. He says it had the appearance of five 
distinct trees ; but he was assured that the space was once 
filled with solid timber, and there was no bark on the 
inside. This circumstance of an old trunk, hollow in the 
interior, becoming separated so as to have the appearance 
of being the remains of several distinct trees, is frequently 
met with in the case of very old mulberry trees in Great 
Britain, and olive trees in Italy. Kircher, about a century 
before Brydone, affirms that an entire flock of sheep might 
be inclosed within the Etna chestnut, as in a fold.* ( Ar- 
boretum Brit. p. 1988 .) 
* One of the most celebrated Chestnut trees on record, is that called the 
Tortworth Chestnut, in England. In 1772, Lord Ducie, the owner, had a 
portrait of it taken, which was accompanied by the following description : 
“ The east view of the ancient Chestnut tree at Tortworth, in the county of 
Gloucester, which measures nineteen yards in circumference, and is mentioned 
by Sir Robert Aikins in his history of that county, as a famous tree in King 
John’s reign : and by Mr. Evelyn in his Sylva, to have been so remarkable in 
the reign of King Stephen, 1135, as then to be called the great Chestnut of 
Tortworth ; from which it may reasonably be presumed to have been standing 
before the Conquest, 1066.” This tree is still standing. 
On the estate of Marshall S. Rice, Esq., at Newton Centre, is a venerable, 
though still vigorous and beautiful chestnut tree, the dimensions of which are 
believed to exceed any tree of the same species in New England. In proof of 
this, we are informed that a correspondence has recently been going on, through 
the medium of one of our agricultural papers, between the owmer of the above 
tree, and several gentlemen in this rnd other States, none of whom have shown 
figures exceeding tho following : size of the “ Rice Tree” — circumference at 
base of trunk, 24 3-10 feet; height, 76 feet: spread of limbs, 93 feet. This 
tree is very prolific, and has never been known to fail of bearing a lajge crop 
of nuts. About five feet from the ground, the trunk divides into two well- 
formed shafts, which run up to the height of thirty feet, without a branch.— 
H. W. S. 
