The times dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1903-1914, 1904-08-07
The Oldest LIVING Thing


The statement recently made that here
are yews In England which are the oil -&S
est living things on this EARTH Thomas
sc..8 Ireland said lis not correct.
TT hese yews are old, cry very old ~
there is&no doubt about that; 4 some Of
them were stalwart trees even before
Caesar landed on t hose shores. T here As q
ono now standing In the churchyard mt Il
5Fortingal, ! In EPerthsilre.8w which Decandole,
nearly n century ago, proved to the sa It's
faction OF botanlsts TO be over twenty
five centuries old \ and another at He'd
$sor, In Buc las, VIII oh Is 9, 224O years old
How Decandole arrived at an apparently
correct estimate OF the enormous age of 4
these living trees IS n sinplo thing, ana i
tho principle IS doubtless we'll known to-
day to MI Il The q eW, "a Ike mos other
trees adds ono line, about the tenth Of
an Inch, to Its circumfereneo each year..
He proved this after an lnYestt ga ton ex-
tending over several years, and we know
now, a hundred years later, that his de-s5
auctions were Ncorrest. The old yeW atl
Hedsor has q trunk twenty-seve ZEN fee & In
diameter, proving Its great q ge and II sls 4
in a sflourishing, healthy condition no W.
like Its brother at Fort ingal. ss5S MI
$f.'rhelr years are few, a houGh. compR u
with those OF the trees I had II, mind
when I made my first assertion that he 4
statement printed about them In n sclen-E
tiAc journal was Incorrect. In one chap
ter OF his writings Humboldt re ers TO a. L
gigantic boabab tree in &C ntral An lca as A
tho oldest organic monument In ~ he
world. This tree has n, trunk twenty-nlnes
feet In diameter, and Adamson, by al
series of careful measurements, demons.
strated sconclusiYely that ~ had lived for
not less than 5,l5O years. ss
rStillSeit Is not the Oldest Il organic
monument in the world. as Humboldt de--sss
clarel, for now Mexican scientists have
proved that n huge sypress tree, { sta ding +
In Chepultepec. with IA trunk liz feet ana i
10 inches IN clronn, Ference. Is Older than
it, older. too. by more & than n thousand
years-rfor 1t has been 8 hoN'n, a 8 conclus IA
lively as these thinga can be shown that
Its age Is about 8, 200 years. 10 become
Impressed with wonder over this, one has
only to dwell on that dura ton for q III tie
while In thought. # "
Yet 1t is not so remarka BILE when one {
stops for a moment to rene amber IN at,
given favorable cond ittons for Its gro VII
and suhstenance, the average tree VIII
never die of old age--its deaf lis merely /
an accident. Other younger and more III 4
orous trees may spring up near " and y
perhaps rob Its roots ct their proper i1oNf.s
ishment; insects may kill II, floods or Il
winds may sweep II away or It's roots y
may come In contact With rock and be
come Il SO gnarled and twisted. bscause
they have not room 10 exp0nd In thelr 4
growth. that they literal ". throttle the
avenues OF ITS susie nance .but these sars (
accidents. IL such things do not happen I
tree may live on for century after Gems
tury sill robust. nourishing, sheltering I
with its wide-spreadin8 branches the nisutl
and women Of age after age-st. Loule /
lGlohe-D Democrat SS3