Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-02

it was time to plant their corn, and we
desire the same guide" When 7. w.
Stuart came into possession of the Wylls
estate, he perpetuated the oak by scat
tering its seed broadcast, and protected
its vigor as far as the skill of man might
direct. Although its mighty girth of
twenty-five feet was a mere shell when
blown down, the branches were in full
foliage, thus leaving lasting impression
on the townsfolk of beauty in age, for
truly the Charter Oak grew old grace
fully. In the Senate chamber of the
Capitol is handsome chair carved from
its wood, and the same material frames
the precious charter of such historic
interest. Connecticut people bring their
children to view the marble tablet that
marks the site of the Charter Oak
The smallest of the Waverly oaks in
Massachusetts, is over seven hundred
years old. Surely Lowell must have been
thinking of one of these when he wrote:
What gnarled stretch, what depth of shade is his!
| There needs no crown to mark the forests king
Or perhaps he sang of that white oak
of the Avery family at Dedham which
is represented on town seal. This re-
|
hundred and fifty years old and bears
the ightning's scar as proudly as a
guardsman his saber cut.
"a garden, you know, is very usual
refuge for disappointed politician re-
marked Alexander Hamilton, when he
stood on his home grounds among his
flowers and gazed at the thrifty gum
trees which symbolized the thirteen
original States. These grounds ex-
tended between 13Sth and 145th-sts of
New-York city; but there is little left of
their beauty, to-day, except the decaying
house, now a private school and the
broken remains of half of the thirteen
gum-treeS.
A famous specimen celebrated in the
national anthem rises like monument
in front OF the Casa de Juntas at Gurnica,
Spain Before Alfonso XII. abrogated
the Basque laws in 1886, the deputies of
the Diet of Vizcaya met under this oak
every two years. The historic oak at
Bromley, England, is landmark of note;
for it once possessed bough so invitingly
low that William Pitt and William Will
berforce were tempted to sit upon it, and
then yielded to a conversation which re-
suited in the presentation of Abolition
of the slave trade" before the House of
Commons in 1880. The ive-oaks in
Audubon Park, New-Orleans, are the
pride and joy of Louisiana. A noble
couple known as George and Martha
Washington, who, summer and winter,
are always in state costume of green,
fringed with gray moss, are rooted-in soil
which once was a splendid French estate.
Although many other instances may
be cited as proof that unusual honor and
affection have. been given to certain
forest productions, great indifference as
well as ignorance among the younger
nations must be recorded in regard to
the preservation of remarkable trees.
There is scarcely town or hamlet in
| America that may not boast a specimen
which is older than the first settler, and
that should be honored and preserved
because of that distinction; and yet the
destruction of such landmark to make
way for new sidewalk or building
is common, and is real calamity that
posterity will feel, while to drive coach
through the trunk of living tree proves