188 
THE AGE OF THE WYE. 
In the meadow opposite the town of Ross there grows a 
remarkable old tree, which has been dignified by the name of 
the Ross Oak ” for many years past. This tree, when I 
measured it, was 29 feet in circumference at 3 feet from the 
ground. The tree had originally been forked at a height of 8 or 
9 feet from the ground, but the eastern limb had fallen many 
years before, and the trunk, when I knew it, had become hollow 
on that side. In the winter of 1849 some boys set it on fire, and 
tbe western limb then fell and came into my possession. When 
this fire occurred The Times and other London papers inserted 
paragraphs about this oak. In some its age was put down at 
900 years, and in others at 1200 or more. Now the land on 
which it stands belongs to Guy’s Hospital, and they still possess 
a capital plan of this estate, made by a surveyor named John 
Green in 1766, and on this plan the position of this tree, which 
was then called the Ross Oak,*’ is marked. It must then have 
been a noble tree and in its prime. 
On Green’s survey the edge of the river was 118 yards from 
the tree, but when I measured it in 1856 the river bank was 170 
yards away. The river had, therefore, shifted its course 52 yards 
downwards in 100 years, and, supposing the river to have 
advanced at the same rate, the tree must have been a sapling on 
its hank 327 years before that time. Again, when I got the fallen 
limb home, 1 found that it was sound to the core at a height that 
must have been about 35 feet from the ground, and, by counting 
the concentric rings, I ascertained the age of the limb to have been 
278 years. If to this we add 40 years for the time it would take 
an oak to grow to a height of 36 feet, and 7 years for the time 
since the limb fell, it will give us 325 years for the age of the 
tree; agreeing remarkably with the former calculation. A third 
calculation from the concentric rings in the shell of the trunk, 
which was still 6 inches thick, made into an average with that of 
a hit of the central part of the trunk which still remained, gave 
