THE OLDEST TREES

Evening Star, Issue 21012, 28 January 1932, Page 12

THE OLDEST TREES

SOME IMMENSE AGES

Why is it that a tree ever ceases to grow? There are various reasons. All things contain within themselves the seeds of decay, and even if accidents do not happen the inner core of the tree trunk decays, and so slowly the whole of it dies.

Yet the length of life of a tree is often much more than that of a human being. No one knows definitely which is the oldest tree in the world, but it is believed that the giant sequoia trees which grow on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada, in California, are not only the oldest trees, but are the oldest living things on the earth. They are certainly more than 2,000 years old, and some of them are thought to be even 5.000 years old. The ancient cedars of Lebanon are quite young in comparison despite their 2,000 years. In Mexico there is a tree which must be thousands of years old, and which was a giant when Cortes rested under it. The circumference of the trunk is 160 ft, and twenty-eight people with arms outstretched and finger-tips touching can just encircle it. Claims have been made that the oldest tree in Europe is the yew of Fortingal, Perthshire. De Candolle and Sir Robert Christison estimated it to be 3.000 years old, and, although only two fragments of the enormous bole remain, they are still putting forth shoots. The oldest surviving species of tree is undoubtedly the ginkgo, sometimes known as the maidenhair tree. This tree lived before the ice age, and seeds have been found embedded in prehistoric clay and rocks. Now it does not grow wild anywhere, usually being planted near temples in China. A tree which owes much to its development by an English ruler is the mulberry, writes Charles H. Lea, in the ‘ Birmingham Mail.’ In 1609 James I. addressed a circular to the sheriffs, deputy-lieutenants, and others throughout the kingdom expressing his anxiety to “wean the people from idleness.” He suggested that they should plant mulberry trees in immense numbers, and then emulate the industry of silkworms by developing the manufacture of silk. To sot an example, the King planted four acres of St. James’s Park with mulberry trees, and one of those who seems to have followed the Royal example was William Shakespeare, who planted a mulberry tree at New Place, Stratford-on-Avon, This tree stood until 1758, when a certain Parson Gastrell, who lived at New Place, being annoyed by visitors, cut down the tree and used it as firewood. Great resentment was caused, the house was surrounded, and Gastrell fled. It is said that he was forbidden to return, and that the townspeople decided never again to allow anyone of the same name to return to the town. Well known to Midlanders is the Boscobel Oak in Shropshire, in which Charles hid aft r the battle of Worcester, and in the neighbouring county of Montgomery there is a historic oak from which Glendower watched tho defeat of Hotspur in 1403. In Hertfordshire there are two fine trees, the first is the Hadley Oak, which marks the spot where the Earl of Warwick fell in the Battle of Barnet in 1471, and the other is Lady Anno Grimston’s tree, which deserves a paragraph to itself. Lady Anne lived a gay life and was convinced that there is no after life. “It is as unlikely,” she said, “that I should live again as that a tree should grow out of my body.” She was buried and almost forgotten when the marble slab above her tomb was found displaced. A new slab was put on, and after some months this was cracked, and through the crack a young shoot appeared. A metal fence was put up,

and now four stout trunks, forming what is thought to be tho largest tree in England, issues from the tomb, while the marble and the metal are twisted into shapeless masses.