OCTANDRIA. TETRAGYNIA. Quercus. 503 
(Q. sessiliflc/ra. Leaves on elongated stalks, deciduous, oblong, with 
acute sinuses nearly opposite: fruit sessile. 
E . Bot. 1845. 
The receptacles of the fruit being perfectly sessile readily distinguishes this 
species ; which it is essential to do, the timber being of inferior quality. 
Leaves more regularly and equally pinnatifid. Tree nearly, if not alto¬ 
gether, as large as the preceding. 
Var. 2. Leaves downy underneath, and more inclined to remain evergreen. 
Durmast Oak. Mart. Rust. t. 12. In the New Forest, Hampshire. Mar- 
tyn. Sussex. Mr. Borrer. 
Sessile-fruited Oak. Bay Oak, about Newberry. Welsh: Derwen 
ddigoesog. Q. sessiliflora. Salisb. Sm. Hook. Grev. Purt. Q. sessilis. 
Ehrh. Q. robur. With. Hull. Abbot. Willd. Huds. (3. Not so general 
as the former species, though not uncommon in woods, parks, &c. espe¬ 
cially in the north of England. Bagley wood. Bobart, in Ray. In many 
parts of Norfolk; also about London. Smith. Very common about 
Himley and King's Swinford, Staffordshire; Corley woods, and Hay¬ 
wood, Warwickshire. Bree, in Purt. Roslin wood. Greville. Edge of 
Birnam wood, near Dunkeld. Hooker. The common Oak of Anglesey 
and the adjacent counties. Davies. Edgbaston Park, Warwickshire. 
T. April—May. E.)* 
* (What the Lion is to beasts, the Eagle to birds, and the great Leviathan to fishes, the 
Oak may be considered among trees, 
“ Lord of the woods, the long-surviving Oak I” 
<{ Multa virftm volvens durando secula vincit.” 
For of all the fifty thousand species of phenogamous plants described in the known world, 
“ from the cedar-tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the 
wall; ” none hath attained so great celebrity, from the most remote ages of antiquity to the 
present time; 
“ The monarch Oak, the patriarch of the trees, 
Shoots rising up and spreads by slow degrees ; 
Three centuries he grows, and three he stays, 
Supreme in state ; and in three more decays.” Dryden. 
Unrivalled in stature, strength, and duration, the emblem of constancy and longevity, this 
vegetable Hercules, “ Quercus arnica Jovi,” sacred to the supreme deity of the heathens, 
nor less venerated as the “ templum nemorale ” of the Patriarchs and Druids, the peculiar 
symbol of Taronwy or Pendaran, the God of Thunder of the latter; when the grove was 
the haunt of Gods, 
- “ Habitarunt Dii quoque sylvas.” 
Or as described by Pliny, tc Jam per se Roborum eligunt lucos; neque ulla sacra sine 
ea fronde conficiunt.” Thus, during the dark ages of Pagan supersition, a prophetic spirit 
was fabled to preside in the largest Oaks ; the priest or druid delivering the oracle being 
concealed in the umbrageous foliage, or in the hollow trunk. 
In truth there is an awful solemnity beneath the shadowy groups of old patrician trees, 
which irresistibly disposes the mind to serious meditation : 
<e It seems idolatry with some excuse 
When our forefather Druids in their Oaks 
Imagined sanctity.” Cowper. 
The Greeks also bestowed due honours on this tree, and of oaken wreaths was composed 
the Roman civic crown. Lucan thus refers to this usage; 
