THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN. 
105 
STATELY ENGLISH TREES. 
YVe are indebted to William Fell, Hexham, England, whom 
all the nurserymen at the Chicago convention met, for a copy 
of the Land Agent’s Record in which is an account of the nine¬ 
teenth annual meeting in London of the English Arboricul- 
tural Society, of which he is a prominent member. The mem¬ 
bers visited Osterley park which for three hundred years—ever 
since Sir Thomas Graham, the founder of the Royal Exchange, 
received it as a gift from the Crown—has been famed for its 
beautiful timber. The red brick mansion, now the seat of the 
Earl of Jersey, is surrounded by a garden laid out in the best 
old English style, and by lawns beautifully planted with cedars 
of Lebanon, stately descendants of the trees that clothed the 
brown slopes of Syria and the Taurus mountains of Asia 
Minor ; Oriental planes, transplanted from the Levant and 
South-eastern Europe ; English elms, and magnificent Spanish 
chestnuts. 
Thence the members drove two or three miles to Syon 
House, the residence of the Duke of Northumberland, which 
has one of the oldest gardens in England, and is unsurpassed 
for the variety of its timber. It stands on the site of an 
ancient monastery suppressed by Henry VIII, whose body 
rested there for a night during the journey from Westminister 
to the tomb at Windsor. The pleasure grounds were laid out 
by “ Capability ” Brown, while successive owners, from the 
time of the Lord Protector Somerset and Henry Percy, ninth 
Earl of Northumberland—to whom James I. granted Syon 
House and the Manor of Isleworth—have contributed to its 
superb collection of rare trees. Though the view on entering 
the park is somewhat circumscribed, no one can fail to be im¬ 
pressed by the massive grandeur of these forest giants, and by 
the rich foliage of the well-defined lines of ash, beech, elm, 
oak, and lime. Great belts of trees flank the west front of the 
mansion, whose red brick walls spring from a groundwork of 
flowering trees and shrubs set among tall ashes and elms. A 
fine cedar of Lebanon and a snowy Mespilus from North 
America arrest the eye immediately one approaches the lawn. 
There are many large ornamental trees and shrubs, such as the 
black walnut (Juglans nigra), from the Western United States, 
the common chestnut, the Portugal laurel, the Judas tree 
(Cercis siliquastrum) of South Europe, noted for its early and 
beautiful scarlet flowers, and as the traditional tree on which 
Judas hanged himself ; the Chinese crab, a lovely flowering 
Stuartia Virginica, from North America; and the Arbutus 
Andrachne, with its richly-colored bark. Other notable speci¬ 
mens, to which attention was directed, are the allspice tree of 
Carolina, one of the sweetest scented of flowers, and the beau¬ 
tiful snowdrop or silver bell tree. 
FIFTY.SEVES VARIETIES OF OAKS. 
Of oaks the grounds of Syon House can boast no fewer than 
fifty-seven different varieties. Near the entrance to the rosary 
is a fine specimen of the cork oak, which yields a porous bark 
that is made into corks. The pine grounds at Syon House 
are also very beautiful, and contain great clusters of magnifi¬ 
cent trees. Other examples that drew the eyes of visitors were 
the giant cedar of Lebanon, qver 80 ft. high, and 15 ft. in 
girth 2}4 ft. from the ground, with branches that spread over 
84 ft.; a majestic flat-headed yew ; a mulberry, believed to be 
the oldest in England, introduced from Persia in 1548, whose 
fruit some of the party tasted and pronounced excellent; and 
that very ornamental tree, the Pterocarya Caucasica, a small 
tree allied to the walnut, and the most western representative 
of the small order Juglandeoe in the old world. Not only are 
the trees at Syon House rare but many of them have attained 
gigantic proportions. Deciduous cypresses from 98 ft. to 104 
ft. high, liquidambars from 80 ft., Cretan maples from 45 ft., 
black poplars from 114 ft., and Sophora Japonica from 70 
ft. are among these forest giants. 
After luncheon, provided by the Duke of Northumberland, 
the visitors drove to Kew, where they were welcomed by Mr. 
Nicholson, curator of the Royal Gardens. Among the speci¬ 
mens that attracted attention were the fine Turkey or mossy- 
cupped oak, presented by Horace YValpole ; the American per¬ 
simmon, and the zizania, or Indian rice, on which the wild 
fowl of America feed, and which is supposed to give its 
peculiar flavor to the canvas-back duck. This tree has been 
cultivated at Kew with great difficulty. The seeds lose their 
vitality in crossing the Atlantic, though some small plants 
have yielded satisfactory results. The Corsican pine, the rare 
Pinus monticola, and the maidenhair tree (Ginkgo biloba) also 
claimed notice. The maidenhair tree is especially remarkable. 
It is a last representative of one of the most ancient types of 
plants, and there is, we believe, only one instance of it having 
been, in recent years at any rate, found in the wild state. In 
Japan it is found only in the precincts of temples, where it has 
been almost certainly planted. Being deciduous it tolerates 
the neighborhood of towns, and though its growth is slow, it 
might with advantage be more cultivated in our parks. In the 
timber museum members of the party found much to interest 
them. 
WILLIAM FELL S SPEECH. 
At the dinner, our mutual friend, Mr. Fell, responded to the 
toast “The English Arboricultural Society.” He said that 
the society was doing a much-needed work, and one that had 
greatly benefited the country. At Shields and in other large 
centres, to say nothing of the Thames Embankment, they could 
find gratifying evidence of what might be done by judicious 
planting. The papers read before the society had been the 
means of disseminating a great deal of useful knowledge. 
That society had judges for their essays who were second to 
none in the United Kingdom. (Hear, hear.) One of them, 
Dr. Somerville, had been selected for the chair of forestry at 
Cambridge, the first holder of the post, which was offered to 
him entirely unsolicited. (Cheers.) The society was doing 
another great work—the encouragement and training of young 
foresters, and the society’s certificates were a guarantee of 
practical knowledge. (Cheers.) The society was in a sounder 
financial position that day than it had ever been before. 
(Cheers.) He was glad to see that in the Isle of Man the 
House of Keys had granted £100 to the local society for tree¬ 
planting. He would be glad if Parliament would give facilities 
for an extension of experimental forestry work. He trusted 
that the visit to Windsor and the other royal parks was the 
first step in the direction of getting their title altered, so that 
it would in future be the Royal English Arboricultural Society. 
(Cheers.) 
The president, Joseph Graham, of South Shields, in his 
speech said that the American institution of Arbor Day might 
with great advantage be copied in Great Britain, training the 
children to plant, instead of destroy trees. The society should 
endeavor to get the educational authorities interested. 
