Woodland Gleanings Part 13

At Elderslie, near Paisley, upon a little knoll, there stood, near the end of the last century, the ruins of an Oak, which was supposed to be the largest tree that ever grew in Scotland. The trunk was then wholly decayed and hollow, but it was evident, from what remained, that its diameter could not have been less than eleven or twelve feet. As to its age, we can only conjecture, from some circ.u.mstances, that it is most likely a tree of great antiquity. The little knoll whereon it stands is surrounded by a swamp, over which a causeway leads to the tree, or rather to a circle which seems to have run round it. The vestiges of this circle, as well as the causeway, bear a plain resemblance to those works which are commonly attributed to the Druids, so that this tree was probably a scene of worship consecrated by these heathen priests. But the credit of it does not depend on the dubious vestiges of Druid antiquity. In a latter scene of greater importance (if tradition ever be the vehicle of truth) it bore a large share. When the ill.u.s.trious and renowned hero, William Wallace, roused the spirit of the Scotch nation to oppose the tyranny of Edward, he frequently chose the solitude of Torwood as a place of rendezvous for his army. There he concealed his numbers and his designs, sallying out suddenly on the enemy's garrisons, and retreating as suddenly when he feared to be overpowered. While his army lay in those woods, the Oak which we are now commemorating was commonly his head-quarters. There the hero generally slept, its hollow trunk being sufficiently capacious, not only to afford shelter to himself, but also to many of his followers. This tree has ever since been known by the name of Wallace tree.

In the enclosure known as the Little Park, in Windsor Forest, there is still standing the supposed Oak immortalized by Shakspeare as the scene of Hern the hunter's exploits:--

--An old tale goes, that Hern the hunter, Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest, Doth all the winter time, at still of midnight, Walk round about this Oak, with ragged horns; And then he blasts the trees, destroys the cattle, Makes the milch cow yield blood, and shakes a chain In hideous, dreadful manner.

_Merry Wives_, iv. 3.

This tree measures about twenty-four feet in circ.u.mference, and is yet vigorous, which somewhat injures its historical credit. For though it is evidently a tree advanced in years, and might well have existed in the time of Elizabeth, it seems too strong and vigorous to have been a proper tree, in that age, for Hern the hunter to have danced round.

Fairies, elves, and that generation of people, are universally supposed to select the most ancient and venerable trees to gambol under; and the poet who should describe them dancing under a sapling, would show very little acquaintance with his subject. That this tree could not be called a venerable tree two centuries ago is evident, because it can scarcely a.s.sume that character even now. And yet an Oak, in a soil it likes, will continue so many years in a vigorous state, that we must not lay more stress on this argument than it will fairly bear. It may be added, however, in its favour, that a pit, or ditch, is still shown near the tree, as Shakspeare describes it, which may have been preserved with the same veneration as the tree itself.

There is an Oak in the grounds of Sir Gerrard Van Neck, at Heveningham, in Suffolk, which carries us likewise into the times of Elizabeth. But this tree brings its evidence with it--evidence which, if necessary, might carry it into the Saxon times. It is now falling fast into the decline of years, and every year robs it more of its honours. But its trunk, which is thirty-five feet in circ.u.mference, still retains its grandeur, though the ornaments of its boughs and foliage are much reduced. But the grandeur of the trunk consists only in appearance; it is a mere sh.e.l.l. In Queen Elizabeth's time it was hollow, and from this circ.u.mstance the tree derives the honour of being handed down to posterity. That princess, who from her earliest years loved masculine amus.e.m.e.nts, used often, it is said, in her youth, to take her stand in this tree and shoot the deer as they pa.s.sed. From that time it has been known by the name of Queen Elizabeth's Oak.

The Swilcar Oak, in the Forest of Needwood, in Staffordshire, was measured about 1771, and found to be nineteen feet in girth at six feet from the ground; and when measured in 1825 it was twenty-one feet four inches and a half in circ.u.mference at the same height from the ground.

This proves that the tree is slowly increasing, having gained two feet four inches in fifty-four years, and yet it is known, by historical doc.u.ments, to be six hundred years old. Though in decay it is still a fine, shapely, characteristic tree. It stands in an open lawn, surrounded by extensive woods. In a poem ent.i.tled _Needwood Forest_ the author thus addresses it:--

Hail! stately Oak, whose wrinkled trunk hath stood, Age after age, the sovereign of the wood: You, who have seen a thousand springs unfold Their ravelled buds, and dip their flowers in gold-- Ten thousand times yon moon relight her horn, And that bright eye of evening gild the morn,--

Yes, stately Oak, thy leaf-wrapped head sublime Ere long must perish in the wrecks of time; Should, o'er thy brow, the thunders harmless break, And thy firm roots in vain the whirlwinds shake, Yet must thou fall. Thy withering glories sunk, Arm after arm shall leave thy mouldering trunk.

The Cowthorpe, or Coltsthorpe Oak, near Wetherby, in Yorkshire, had its princ.i.p.al branch rent off by a storm in the year 1718, when it was accurately measured, and found to contain more than five tons of timber.

Previous to this mutilation, its branches are said to have extended over half an acre of ground. At three feet from the ground, this most gigantic of all trees is sixteen yards, or forty-eight feet, and close to the root it is twenty-six yards, or seventy-eight feet, in girth! Its princ.i.p.al limb projects forty-eight feet from the trunk. It is still in wonderful preservation, though its foliage is thin. It has been called the King of the British Sylva, and, indeed, it deserves the t.i.tle, and proud we may be of such a king.

There were two trees in Yardley Forest, called Gog and Magog, which demand our notice on account of one of them having been celebrated by the muse of Cowper. The scenery in which they stood is hallowed by his shade. He was fond of indulging his melancholy minstrel musings among the woodland scenery there. Gog, the larger of these two Oaks, measured thirty-eight feet round at the roots, and was twenty-eight feet in circ.u.mference at three feet from the ground. It was fifty-eight feet high, and contained one thousand six hundred and sixty-eight feet seven inches of solid timber. Magog was only forty-nine feet in height; but its circ.u.mference was fifty-four feet four inches at the ground, and thirty-one feet three at three feet high. These two trees were near each other, and although a good deal bared at the top by age, they were very picturesque. We shall quote here the whole of Cowper's Address to the "Yardley Oak"; from which it would appear that only one of them then remained:--

Survivor sole, and hardly such, of all That once lived here, thy brethren, at my birth (Since which I number threescore winters pa.s.s'd) A shatter'd veteran, hollow-trunk'd perhaps, As now, and with excoriate forks deform, Relics of ages! Could a mind, imbued With truth from Heaven, created thing adore, I might with reverence kneel, and worship thee.

It seems idolatry with some excuse, When our forefather Druids in their Oaks Imagined sanct.i.ty. The conscience, yet Unpurified by an authentic act Of amnesty, the meed of blood Divine, Loved not the light; but, gloomy, into gloom Of thickest shades, like Adam after taste Of fruit proscribed, as to a refuge, fled.

Thou wast a bauble once; a cup and ball, Which babes might play with; and the thievish jay, Seeking her food, with ease might have purloin'd The auburn nut that held thee, swallowing down Thy yet close-folded lat.i.tude of boughs, And all thine embryo vastness at a gulp.

But Fate thy growth decreed; autumnal rains Beneath thy parent tree mellow'd the soil Design'd thy cradle; and a skipping deer, With pointed hoof dibbling the glebe, prepared The soft receptacle, in which, secure, Thy rudiments should sleep the winter through.

So Fancy dreams. Disprove it, if ye can, Ye reasoners broad awake, whose busy search Of argument, employ'd too oft amiss, Sifts half the pleasure of sweet life away I Thou fell'st mature; and in the loamy clod, Swelling with vegetative force instinct, Didst burst thine egg, as theirs the fabled Twins, Now stars; two lobes, protruding, pair'd exact; A leaf succeeded, and another leaf; And, all the elements thy puny growth Fostering propitious, thou becamest a twig.

Who lived, when thou wast such? O, couldst thou speak, As in Dodona once thy kindred trees Oracular, I would not curious ask The future, best unknown, but at thy mouth Inquisitive, the less ambiguous past.

By thee I might correct, erroneous oft, The clock of history, facts and events Timing more punctual, unrecorded facts Recovering, and misstated setting right-- Desperate attempt, till trees shall speak again!

Time made thee what thou wast, king of the woods; And Time hath made thee what thou art--a cave For owls to roost in. Once thy spreading boughs O'erhung the champaign; and the numerous flocks That grazed it, stood beneath that ample cope Uncrowded, yet safe-sheltered from the storm.

No flock frequents thee now. Thou hast outlived Thy popularity, and art become (Unless verse rescue thee awhile) a thing Forgotten, as the foliage of thy youth.

While thus through all the stages thou hast push'd Of treeship--first a seedling hid in gra.s.s; Then twig; then sapling; and, as century roll'd Slow after century, a giant bulk Of girth enormous, with moss-cushioned root Upheaved above the soil, and sides emboss'd With prominent wens globose--till at the last The rottenness, which time is charged to inflict On other mighty ones, found also thee.

What exhibitions various hath the world Witness'd of mutability in all That we account most durable below!

Change is the diet on which all subsist, Created changeable, and change at last Destroys them. Skies uncertain now the heat Transmitting cloudless, and the solar beam Now quenching in a boundless sea of clouds-- Calm and alternate storm, moisture and drought, Invigorate by turns the springs of life In all that live--plant, animal, and man-- And in conclusion mar them. Nature's threads, Fine pa.s.sing thought, ev'n in her coa.r.s.est works, Delight in agitation, yet sustain The force that agitates, not unimpaired; But, worn by frequent impulse, to the cause Of their best tone their dissolution owe.

Thought cannot spend itself, comparing still The great and little of thy lot, thy growth From almost nullity into a state Of matchless grandeur, and declension thence, Slow, into such magnificent decay.

Time was, when, settling on thy leaf, a fly Could shake thee to the root--and time has been When tempests could not. At thy firmest age Thou hadst within thy bole solid contents, That might have ribb'd the sides and plank'd the deck Of some flagg'd admiral; and tortuous arms, The shipwright's darling treasure, didst present To the four-quarter'd winds, robust and bold, Warp'd into tough knee-timber,[1] many a load!

But the axe spared thee. In those thriftier days Oaks fell not, hewn by thousands, to supply The bottomless demands of contest, waged For senatorial honours. Thus to Time The task was left to whittle thee away With his sly scythe, whose ever-nibbling edge, Noiseless, an atom, and an atom more, Disjoining from the rest, has, un.o.bserved, Achieved a labour, which had far and wide, By man perform'd, made all the forest ring.

Embowell'd now, and of thy ancient self Possessing naught but the scoop'd rind, that seems A huge throat, calling to the clouds for drink, Which it would give in rivulets to thy root-- Thou temptest none, but rather much forbidst The feller's toil, which thou couldst ill requite.

Yet is thy root sincere, sound as the rock, A quarry of stout spurs and knotted fangs, Which, crook'd into a thousand whimsies, clasp The stubborn soil, and hold thee still erect.

So stands a kingdom, whose foundation yet Fails not, in virtue and in wisdom laid; Though all the superstructure, by the tooth Pulverised of venality, a sh.e.l.l Stands now, and semblance only of itself!

Thine arms have left thee. Winds have rent them off Long since, and rovers of the forest wild With bow and shaft have burn'd them. Some have left A splinter'd stump, bleach'd to a snowy white; And some, memorial none where once they grew.

Tet life still lingers in thee, and puts forth Proof not contemptible of what she can, Even where death predominates. The spring Finds thee not less alive to her sweet force, Than yonder upstarts of the neighbouring wood, So much thy juniors, who their birth received Half a millennium since the date of thine.

But since, although well qualified by age To teach, no spirit dwells in thee, nor voice May be expected from thee, seated here On thy distorted root, with hearers none, Or prompter, save the scene--I will perform, Myself the oracle, and will discourse In my own ear such matter as I may.

One man alone, the father of us all, Drew not his life from woman; never gazed, With mute unconsciousness of what he saw, On all around him; learn'd not by degrees, Nor owed articulation to his ear; But, moulded by his Maker into man At once, upstood intelligent, survey'd All creatures, with precision understood Their purport, uses, properties, a.s.sign'd To each his name significant, and, fill'd With love and wisdom, render'd back to Heaven, In praise harmonious, the first air he drew.

He was excused the penalties of dull Minority. No tutor charged his hand With the thought-tracing quill, or task'd his mind With problems. History, not wanted yet, Lean'd on her elbow, watching Time, whose course Eventful should supply her with a theme.

[1] Knee-timber is found in the crooked arms of Oak, which, by reason of their distortion, are easily adjusted to the angle formed where the deck and the ship's sides meet.

Montgomery inscribed the following lines under a drawing of the Yardley Oak, celebrated in the preceding quotation from Cowper:--

The sole survivor of a race Of giant Oaks, where once the wood Bang with the battle or the chase, In stern and lonely grandeur stood.

From age to age it slowly spread Its gradual boughs to sun and wind; From age to age its n.o.ble head As slowly wither'd and declined.

A thousand years are like a day, When fled;--no longer known than seen; This tree was doom'd to pa.s.s away, And be as if it _ne'er_ had been;--

But mournful Cowper, wandering nigh, For rest beneath its shadow came, When, lo! the voice of days gone by Ascended from its hollow frame.

O that the Poet had reveal'd The words of those prophetic strains, Ere death the eternal mystery seal'd ----Yet in his song the Oak remains.

And fresh in undecaying prime, _There_ may it live, beyond the power Of storm and earthquake, Man and Time, Till Nature's conflagration-hour.

There are various opinions as to the best mode of rearing Oak-trees; we shall here state that which Evelyn considered the best. In raising Oak-trees from acorns sown in the seminary, a proper situation should be prepared by the time the seeds are ripe. The soil should be loamy, fresh, and in good heart. This should be well prepared by digging, breaking the clods, clearing it of weeds, stones, &c. The acorns should be collected from the best trees; and if allowed to remain until they fall off, they will germinate the better. Sow the acorns in beds about three inches asunder, press them down gently with the spade, and rake the earth over the acorns until it is raised about two inches above them. The plants will not appear in less than two months; and here they may be allowed to remain for two years at least, without any further care than keeping them free from weeds, and occasionally refreshing them with water in dry weather.

When the plants are two years old they will be of a proper size for planting out, and the best way to do this is by trenching or ploughing as deeply as the soil will allow. The sets should be planted about the end of October. This operation should be commenced by striking the plants carefully out of the seed-bed, shortening the tap-root, and topping off part of the side shoots, that there may be an equal degree of strength in the stem and the root. After planting they should be well protected from cattle, and, if possible, from hares and rabbits. They must also be kept clear from weeds.

Mr. Evelyn was of opinion, that Oaks thus raised will yield the best timber. And Dr. Hunter remarks, that the extensive plantations which were made towards the end of the last century, were made more with a view to shade and ornament than to the propagation of good timber; and with this object the owners planted their trees generally too old, so that many of the woods, when they come to be felled, will greatly disappoint the expectations of the purchaser.

Oaks are about eighteen years old before they yield any fruit, a peculiarity which seems to indicate the great longevity of the tree; for "soon ripe and soon rotten," is an adage that holds generally throughout the organic world. The Oak requires sixty or seventy years to attain a considerable size; but it will go on increasing and knowing no decay for centuries, and live for more than 1000 years.

In reference to the durability of Oak timber when used in ship-building, the following statement has been elicited by a Select Committee appointed to inquire into the cause of the increased number of shipwrecks. The Sub-Committee addressed a letter to the Lords of the Admiralty, who consulted the officers of the princ.i.p.al dock-yards, and returned the following abstract account of the officers of the yards'

opinion on the durability of Oak timber:--

---------------+-----------------------+------------+----------+ When used for Floors When used and Lower Futtocks for planking When used OAK only. above for the TIMBER. +------------+----------+ light Upper In Afore and watermark. Timbers. Midships. Abaft. ---------------+------------+----------+------------+---------- From 100 to From 20 to From 20 to From 30 to English. 24 years. 12 years. 12 years. 15 years. Average of yards 42 - 15 - - 16 - - 20 - ---------------+------------+----------+------------+---------- From 30 to From 15 to From 12 to From 15 to Of the growth 9 years. 8 years. 4 years. 4 years. of the North Average of of Europe. yards 18 - 10 - - 9 - - 10 - ---------------+------------+----------+------------+---------- Of the growth of the British North American From 30 to From 15 to From 12 to From 16 to Colonies, 5 years. 3 years. 2 years. 2 years. generally Average of known as Quebec yards 17 - 9 - - 9 - - 11 - white Oak. ---------------+------------+----------+------------+----------+

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ORIENTAL PLANE.]

THE ORIENTAL PLANE.

[_Plata.n.u.s[P] orientalis._ Nat. Ord.--_Platanaceae_; Linn.--_Monoec.

Polya._]

[P] _Plata.n.u.s. Flowers_ unis.e.xual, the barren and fertile upon one plant, disposed many together, and densely, in globular catkins.

_Pistils_ numerous, approximately pairs. _Ovary_ 1-celled, including 1-2 pendulous ovules. _Stigmas_ 2, long, filiform, glandular in the upper part. _Fruit_ autricle, densely covered with articulated hairs, including one pendulous, oblong, exalb.u.minous seed.

The Oriental Plane is a native of Greece, and of other parts of the Levant; it is found in Asia Minor, Persia, and eastward to Cashmere; and likewise in Barbary, in the south of Italy, and in Sicily, although probably not indigenous in these countries. It appears to have been introduced into England about the middle of the sixteenth century; but seems not to have been propagated to the extent it deserves, even as an ornamental tree; and the specimens now in existence are neither very numerous, nor are they distinguished for their dimensions.

In the East, the Oriental Plane grows to the height of seventy feet and upwards, with widely spreading branches and a ma.s.sive trunk; forming altogether a majestic tree. The trunk is covered with a smooth bark, which scales off every year in large irregular patches, often producing a pleasing variety of tint. The bark of the younger branches is of a dark brown, inclined to a purple colour. The leaves are alternate, about seven inches long and eight broad, deeply cut into five segments, and the two outer ones slightly cut into two more. These segments are acutely indented on their borders, each having a strong midrib, with numerous lateral veins. The upper side of the leaves is a deep green, the under side pale. The petioles are rather long, with an enlargement at the base which covers the nascent buds. The catkins which contain the seed are of a globular form, and from two to five in number, on axillary peduncles; they vary greatly in size, and are found from four inches to scarcely one in circ.u.mference. The flowers are very minute. The b.a.l.l.s, which are about the size of walnuts, and fastened together often in pairs like chain-shot, appear before the leaves in spring, and the seed ripens late in autumn; these are small, not unlike the seed of the lettuce, and are surrounded or enveloped in a bristly down.