The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1906-12-05

challenged attention; on this occasion
with revised" claim to the age OF
TWO thousand years.
1t has been repeatedly visited and de-
scribed, and there can be no doubt as
to Its being tree of patriarchal vene-
rability. But the subject of its age has
so often been dismissed with the esti-
mate that it must be 'tat least a thau-
sand years old, that the addition of
another thousand is a little startling.
The facility with which this result has
been attained is, however, eminently
characteristic. In a recent account of
the tree attention is called to sugges-
ton of the late Dean Farrar, that both
st. Luke and st. Paul had probably
rested beneath its shade. The idea is
highly picturesque, says the London
Globe, but it can only be soberly re-
garded as a piece of effective local col
o..
This, however, is by no means the
only tree of its kind which has been
similarly endowed with a fancy age.
The famous plane near Caphyoe, in
Arcadia, is thought to be the identical
tree referred to by Pausanlas in the
second century; and another near Con-
stantinople is considered of equal age.
or course, these trees belong to the
oriental branch Of the great Platanus
family, the planes with which London
ers are so pleasantly familiar being all
of the western species.
On such a subject we have still to
look to the German Forestry depart
ment for some of the most carefully
ascertained facts and deductions, 1t is
the opinion of those best qualified ITO
judge that there is no European tree
which can be proved to be older than
eight hundred years, and that no tree
in Germany attains that age in a
healthy state. The rings formed by
the annual growth Of exogenous trees
are of course, the best evidence OF
their age, but this is only to be at
tained before decays effacing fingers
have obliterated the record.
Documentary evidence of the exist
ence of a specified tree at remote date
| is not necessarily conclusive. Trees
are often thus referred to as acknowl-
edged boundary marks, which seems K
! invest them with an authenticity which
they do not really possess. 1t is not
question Of the truth of the record, bu
it is fact that young trees have no
seldom been planted on the sites occu
/ pied by famous predecessors and
standing, as 1t were, in their shoes
| have come to be taken for them.
"A good illustration Of such posi-
| bility is afforded by the Rufus Stone l
the New Forest. AS its name apple
and its inscription records, this ston
was erected on the spot formerly GOV
cred by the oak from which the arroN
which slew William Rufus is said t
have glanced. This tree in an ad
vanoed state of decay, was in existenc
in the eighteenth century, but was re
placed in 1745 by a stone which was i
/ self restored in 1912.
There are instances in which q your
tree has sprung spontaneously at tn
very foot of It's ancestor and other
in which the lusty offspring has take
bodily possession of the hollow trun
and thriven at it's expense. 1t is by r
means unlikely that some Of our hi
toric oaks have undergone this tran
, formation They are still numerol
though rapidly diminishing body ar
their ages can only be assumed fro
the traditions attached to them. Q
which ground all that can be said
, that they must necessarily be old
, than the tales they tell, Ages Of sevt
, or eight hundred years have undoub
4 eddy been attained by some, as
which there is exceptionally clear do
umentary evidence.
9 The famous Tortworth chestnut SUI
: posed TO have been formed by the jun
J. ton of two trees-was mentioned as
A boundary of that manor in a record
!, the year 11S5 The Swilear Lawn GA
: in Needwood Forest is proved by hi
n torical documents to have been at lea
8 six hundred years old, and in 1922
+ was far from being in the last stage
o decay. AT the same date a large el
Q was still in existence at Chipste'
place in Kent, under which-as shoy
o by historic records-an annual fair w
= held in the time of Henry Y,
9 An oak at Tilford, near Farnhan1,
q supposed to have been referred to in
. charter granted by Henry de Blois
1850; and a remarkable tree In Norfo