ed with Larch, might become ufeful ornaments to this country! When paffing from London to Portsmouth, the brims of the Devil's Punch-bowl ftrike the eye as a spot which, thus planted, might become as pleasant an object as it is now difagreeable or frightful in dark or cloudy weather. This idea ftrikes more particularly, as being fo near to the great naval repofitory.

The Larch is equally useful for many purposes in hufbandry, and in domeftic uses. For the latter it has one quality that renders it peculiarly defirable, viz. that it is the most fufceptible of fire of any timber. Added to thefe ufeful purposes, it will not take up any grounds fit for the oak; for trong foils are the only ones on which it does not thrive.

Thefe confiderations tempt me to fend you an account of an eafy and expeditious way of raising them, not founded on theory, but on the practice of many years; a practice in which willows have been planted in fome of the coldeft fituations in Scotland, where they are of a remarkably quick growth, and yet the wood is very fine grained. The planter has now many trees of his own planting which are fix feet in circumference at the height of three feet from the ground. The Duke of Athol has now Larches, planted in 1743, which are upwards of eight feet in circumference.

The method of getting the feeds out of the cones is, not to gather them till about Candlemas, when they begin to drop off the trees. At the end of April, or beginning of May, fooner or later, as the weather ferves, prepare fome beds in a nutfery, to which the fun has free accefs and lay the coues on that bed as thick as they lay clear of one another, and the fun will foon open them, and they will fhed their feed. The owner fhould, from time to time, examine what quantity of feed they have fhed; and

enough to fill the ground with plants, the cones fhould be carried off the ground, and fet on them about a quarter of an inch thick of good mould. The cones may then be carried to another bed, and laid as before, and they will fill it with feed in good time to yield plants that feafon. If the cones are kept dry during the winter, more feed may, in the fame manner, be procured next feafon.

When the plants are two years old, they may be planted in the autumn, or next fpring; but the autumn is thought the beft, particularly in dry foils; for, if the fpring is dry, the ground will be fo dry as to kill the plants. They are planted out with a narrow iron ipade, with which a cross cut is made to receive the plant.

When the plants stand another year in the feed-bed, or have been a year in a nursery, they then push out to fuch a height, that it is neceffary to dig fmall pits for them, which is the fureft way. The young plants mu be well fenced from cattle, efpecialty fheep, which are very fond of them; and, when the head is cut off by any accident, it impairs the heart of the tree to the very root.

As they overtop almoft every other tree, they are the more exposed to every high wind; other quick-growing trees fhould therefore be planted among them; or they may be planted in clumps, fo as to protect one another.

Another advantage might attend the planting the dry eminences; that, when the young trees have grown up, the earth is fo much fhaded, that the dews and rain are not fo foon exhaled by the fun and winds as in open fituations. By this means the moisture penetrates deeper, till it meets with a fubftance impervious to water; it then descends on that substance till it again reaches the furface, and breaks out in fprings. Thus water may be procured in fuch dry fituations, where it may be much wanted for affording

The largest tree that ever was known to be brought into Britain, formed the main maft of the Royal Sovereign in Queen Anne's time. It was ninety feet long, and thirty-five inches in dia

meter.

Mr Evelin, from whom we have this account, mentions in the fame place a ftill larger tree, which formed the keel of the Crown, a French fhip of the last century. It was one hundred and twenty feet long.

The mafts of our fhips of war, at prefent, are never made of fingle trees. It is the method to lay two or three trees together, and fitting them tight to each other, to bind them clofe, at proper diftances with pitched ropes. But a very noble fir was lately brought into England, which was not fpliced in the common mode, but was converted, in its full dimenfions, into the bowfprit of the Britannia, a new fhip of one hundred and ten guns; in which capacity I have heard it ferves at prefent. This fir was ninety-fix feet in length.

The oaks of Chaucer are celebrated, in the annals of poetry, as the trees, under which

-the laughing fage Carolled his moral fongThey grew in the park at Donningtoncatle, near Newbery, where Chaucer 1pent his latter life in ftudious retirement. -The largest of these trees was called the king's-oak, and carried an erect ftem of fifty feet before it broke into branches, and was cut into to a beam five feet fquare.The next in fize was called the queen'soak, and furvived the calamities of the civil wars in King Charles' time; though Donnington-caftle and the country around it were fo often the scenes of action and defolation. Its branches were very curious; they pushed out from the ftem in feveral uncommon directions, imitating the horns of a ram rather than the branches of an oak. When it was felled, it yielded a bean forty feet long, with

out knot or blemish, perfectly ftrait, four feet fquare at the but-end, and near a yard at the top.- -The third of thefe oaks was called Chaucer's, of which we have no particulars; in general, only, we are told, that it was a noble tree, though inferior to either of the others. None of them, I fhould' fuppofe from this account, was a tree of picturefque beauty. A ftrait stem, of forty or fifty feet, let its head be what it will, can hardly produce a picturefque form. When we admired the ftone-pine, we fuppofed its ftem to take a fweeping line; and to be broken alfo with ftumps, or decayed branches.

Close by the gate of the water-walk, at Magdalen college in Oxford, grew. an oak, which perhaps ftood there a faplin, when Alfred the Great founded the univerfity. This period only in-. cludes a fpace of nine hundred years, which is no great age for an oak. It is a difficult matter indeed to ascertain the age of a tree. The age of a caftle or abbey is the object of hiftory. Ever a common houfe is recorded by the family that built it. All these objects arrive at maturity in their youth, if I may fo fpeak. But the tree gradually completing its growth, is not worth recording in the early part of its exiftence. It is then only a common tree; and afterwards, when it becomes. remarkable for its age, all memory of its youth is loft. This tree, however, can almoft produce hiftorical evidence for the age affigned to it. About five. hundred years after the time of Alfred, William of Wainfleet, Dr Sukely tells us, exprefsly ordered his col-, lege to be founded near the great and an oak could not, I think, be lefs than five hundred years of age, to merit that title; together with the honour of fixing the fite of a college.When the magnificence of Cardinal. Wolfey erected that handsome tower, which is fo ornamental to the whole building, this tree might probably be in the meridian of its glory; or rather

oak;

perhaps

perhaps it had attained a green old age. But it muft have been manifeftly in its decline, at that memorable æra, when the tyranny of James gave the fellows of Magdalen fo noble an opportunity of withstanding bigotry and fuperftition. It was afterwards much injured in Charles II's time, when the prefent walks were laid out. Its roots were disturbed; and from that period it declined faft, and be came reduced by degrees to little more than a mere trunk. The oldest members of the university can scarce recollect it in better plight. But the faithful records of history have handed dowa its ancient dimenfions. Thro' a face of fixteen yards, on every fide from its trunk, it once flung its boughs, and under its magnificent pavilion could have heltered with ease three thousand men, tho' in its decayed ftate it could for many years do little more than shelter fome lucklefs individual, whom the driving fhower had overtaken in his evening walk. In the fummer of the year 1788 this magnificent ruin fell to the ground, alarming the college with its rufhing found. It then appeared how precariously it had food for many years. Its grand tap-root was decayed; and it had hold of the earth only by two or three roots, of which none was more than a couple of inches in diameter. From a part of its ruins a chair has been made for the prefident of the college, which will long continue its

memory.

Near Workfop grew an oak, which in refpect both to its own dignity, and the dignity of its fituation, deferves honourable mention. In point of gran deur few trees equalled it. It overfpread a space of ninety feet from the extremities of its oppofite boughs. Thefe dimenfions will produce an area capable, on mathematical calculation, of covering a fquadron of two hundred and thirty five horfe. The dignity of is ftation was equal to the dignity of the tree itlelf. It flood on

E e VOL. XIV. No. 81.

a point, where Yorkshire, Notting hamfhire, and Derbyshire unite, and fpread its fhade over a portion of each. From the honourable station of thus fixing the boundaries of three large counties, it was equally refpected thro the domains of them all; and was known far and wide, by the honourable diftinction of the fire-oak, by which appellation it was marked a mong cities, towns, and rivers, in all the larger maps of England.

In the garden at Tortworth, in Glocenterfhiré, an old family-feat, belong ing to Lord Ducie, grows a Spanish chefaut of great age and dimenfions. Traditional accounts fuppofe it to have been a boundary-tree in the time of King John; and I have met with on ther accounts, which place it in the fame honourable station in the reign of King Stephen. How much older it may be we know not. Confiderably older it probably was: for we rarely make boundary-trees of faplins and off-fets, which are liable to a thoufand accidents, and are unable to maintain, with proper dignity, the station delegated to them. This tree is at prefent in hands which justly value and protect its age. It was barely included within the garden-wall, which bore hard upon it. Lord Ducie removed the incumbrance, and at the fame time applied fresh earth to the roots of the tree, which feems to have enlivened it. So late as in the year 1788 it produced great quantities of chefnuts; which, though fmall, were fweet and well-flavoured.In the great chefnut caufe between Barrington and Ducarel this venerable tree was called upon as an evidence; and gave a very refpectable teftimony in favour of the ch fnuts.

After mentioning this chefnur, which has been celebrated fo much, I cannot forbear mentioning another, which is equally remarkable for having never been celebrated at all, tho' it is one of the laigeft trees that perhaps ever exifted in England. If it had

ever

ever been noticed merely for its bulk, I fhould have paffed it over among 0ther gigantic plants that had nothing elfe to boat; but as no hiftorian or antiquarian, fo far as I have heard, hath taken the leaft notice of it, I thought it right from this very circum ftance to make up the omiffion, by giving it, at leaf, what little credit thefe papers could give. This chefnut grows at a place called Wimley, near Hitchin-priory in Hertfordshire. In the year 1789, at five feet above the ground, its girth was fomewhat more than fourteen yards. Its trunk was hollow, and in part open; but its vegetation was fliil vigorous. On one fide its vaft arms, fhooting up in various forms, fome upright, and others oblique, were decayed, and peel ed at the extremities; but iflued from Juxuriant foliage at their infertion in the trunk. On the other fide, the foliage was still full, and hid all decay. In a glade of Hainhaalt foreft in Effex, about a mile from Barkingfide, stands an oek, which has been known through many centuries by the name of Fairlop. The tradition of the country traces it half way up the Chriftian æra. It is ftill a noble tree, tho' it has now fuffered greatly from the depredations of time. About a yard from the ground, where its rough Auted flem is thirty-fix feet in circumference, it divides into eleven vaft arms; yet not in the borizontal manner of an oak, but rather in that of a beech. Beneath its fhade, which overfpreads an area of three hundred et in circuit, ad annual fair has long been held on the 2d of July, and no both is fuffered to be erected beyond the extent of its boughs. But as their extremities are now become faplefs, and age is yearly curtailing their length, the liberties of the fair feem to be in a very defponding condition. The honour, however, is great. But honours are often accompanied with inconveniences; and Fairlop has fuffered from its honourable diftinctions,

In the feafting that attends a fair, fires are often neceffary; and no places feemed fo proper to make them in as the hollow cavities formed by the heaving roots of the tree. This prac tice has brought a fpeedier decay on Fairlop than it might otherwife have fuffered.

Not far from Blanford, in Dorfet fhie, food very lately a trec, known by the name of Damory's oak. About five or fix centuries ago it was probably in a frate of maturity. At the ground its circumference was fixty. eight feet; and feventeen feet above the ground its diameter was four yards. As this vaft trunk decayed, it became hollow, forming a cavity, which was fift en feet wide, and feventeen feet high, capable of holding twenty men. During the civil wars, and till after the Reftoration, this cave was regularly inhabited by an old man, who fold ale in it. In the violent ftorm in the year 1703 it fuffered greatly, many of its nobleft limbs having been torn from it. But it was still fo grand a ruin, above forty years after, that fome of its branches were feventy-five feet high and extended feventy-two. In the year 1755, when it was fit for nothing but firewood, it was fold for fourteen pounds.

In Torwood, in the county of Stirling, upon a little knoll fland at this time the ruins of an oak, which is fuppofed to be the largest tree that ever grew in Scotland. The trunk of it is now wholly decayed and hollow; but it is evident, from what remains, that its diameter could not have been lefs than eleven or twelve feet. What its age may be is matter only of conjecture: but from fome circumftances it is probably a tree of great antiquity. The little knoll it ftands on, is forrounded by a fwamp, over which a caufe way leads to the tree, or rather to a circle which feems to have run round it. The veftiges of this circle. as well as the caufeway, bear a plaine refemblance to thefe works, which are commonly