they have not measured fairly. The Oaks at 
Bagbt’s Park are not pollards and squats ; their 
^ noble trunks run up to a great height, and hence 
^ their large cubical contents. The King Tree, 
which I partly measured and partly estimated, 
standing in the “cliffs,” is 20 feet round at 
5 feet, runs up without a limb 30 feet, and 
thence to the top 70 feet. That is a tall Oak. 
The trunk of the Beggar’s Oak measures 33 feet 
to the crown. This is the most picturesque 
tree in the park, with a noble trunk 20 feet, and 
27 feet in girth, measured fairly, or 68 feet if 
you measure round the spurs which buttress 
the tree all round, and project several feet 
above the surface of the ground which they 
clutch. The price offered for the King Tree in 
1812 was ;£2 oo for the first length of the trunk 
at 12s. per foot, and ^93 for the remainder, 
including bark at ^14 per ton. 
The Oak trees of this park are all of the best 
and oldest British breed, with stalked acorns ; 
one among them has variegated leaves. There 
are 1000 acres of park, and 1300 acres of 
planted Oak outside the park. When the price 
was 6^*. per foot, 100,000 worth of Oak timber 
might have been felled, it is said, without 
touching the ornamental timber ; so the noble 
owners, notwithstanding their residence is 
several miles distant, have incurred no small 
sacrifice for the sake of their timber. 
I mentioned the poor soil. A wretched patch 
of lias clay soil overspreads the high ground 
here, a remnant of a larger area. It is a poor 
yellow or slate-coloured clay, which could not 
be farmed profitably just now. Owners of- 
similar soils, as yet unplanted, will, perhaps, 
take the hint. 
I made a special pilgrimage, when staying in 
the district, to visit that tall and sturdy patriarch 
of Needwood Forest, the Swilcar Lawn Oak. It 
stands on the highest ground of the neighbour- 
hood, measuring 27 feet round at 5 feet, and 
towering to a great height. This old Oak — 
larger, stronger, and possessing more vitality 
than its neighbours — reminds me of a constitu- 
tionally tough family living on the spot. An 
old deer stealer, who plied his trade here before 
the enclosure, lived to the age of a hundred ; 
his son mowed the grass round the Swilcar 
Lawn Oak at eighty-eight, and died at ninety 
of his epidemic ; and his grandson seems 
in for a very long innings, too. Mr. Mundy, of 
Eland Lodge, who rode after his hounds 
in green through the glades of Needwood, and 
published a poem, called the Fall of Needwood^ 
in 1808, about the time of the enclosure prac- 
tically, named the Swilcar Lawn Oak the 
forest’s “ chief mourner.” There was much 
which a poet might mourn who kept hounds, ] 
for the forest in its pristine state was a pic- ‘ 
turesque maze of great Oaks and other forest ’ 
trees, of Hollies, Thorns, and underwood. * 
There were 10,000 acres full of deer and other ^ 
game, with any amount of poaching on the part ^ 
of the “ ancient cottagers ” on the spot, and of ^ 
people from the adjacent villages. Originally f 
the forest had its customary officers — a lieu- 
tenant, rangers, axe-bearers, keepers, and wood- f 
mote court ; it had five wards, including those <1 
of Uttoxeter and Tutbury, and four lodges, the ti 
residences of the keepers. These are now good 
country houses, leased from the Crown, and 
around them are parks which form specimens 
on a small scale of what the forest once was. 
One of these was occupied by Mr. Mundy, the 
poet who rode in green, and the ancestor, I 
believe, of the owner of the Royal Agricultural 
Society’s ist prize dairy farm of the present 
year. Yoxal Lodge was occupied by Mr. 
Gisborne, author of agricultural articles in the 
Quarterly Review. A Traveller. 
, ■ 
The ^ Pkhdhoh^ . in presid ing 
over the Phylloxera Congress at Montbrison, alluding 
to the unnecessary restrictions placed on the transport 
of Vines, and stated that cuttings of the young wood 
without any heel of the old wood might be sent from 
place to place without danger, and still less danger 
attended the transport of the seeds. 
