A fine oak is one of the most picturesque of Trees. It conveys to the
mind associations of strength and duration, which are very impressive.
The oak stands up against the blast, and does not take, like other
trees, a twisted form from the action of the winds. Except the cedar of
Lebanon, no tree is so remarkable for the stoutness of its limbs: they
do not exactly spring from the trunk, but divide from it; and thus it
is sometimes difficult to know which is stem and which is branch. The
twisted branches of the oak, too, add greatly to its beauty; and the
horizontal direction of its boughs, spreading over a large surface,
completes the idea of its sovereignty over all the trees of the forest.
Even a decayed oak,--

"------dry and dead,
Still clad with reliques of its trophies old,
Lifting to heaven its aged hoary head,
Whose foot on earth Hath got but feeble hold--"


--even such a tree as Spenser has thus described is strikingly
beautiful: decay in this case looks pleasing. To such an oak Lucan
compared Pompey in his declining state.


_The Cedar_.


The cedar of Lebanon, though it has been introduced into many parts of
England as an ornamental tree, and has thriven well, has not yet been