Here then stands the beech-tree, in all its dignity and fair proportions, its firm trunk based in the earth, but with no knarled roots upheaving the soil around, and making it unsightly. When the celebrated Smeaton pondered within himself concerning the possibility of constructing a building on the Eddystone rock, which might resist the tremendous violence of contending seas, which had swept away the previous erections of Winstanley and Rudyerd, and left not a stone remaining; seas which dash at least two hundred feet above the rock, and the sound of whose deafening surges resemble the continuous roar of thunder, his thoughts involuntarily turned towards the oak. He considered its large swelling base, which becomes reduced to one third, occasionally to one half of its original dimensions, by a gradual and upward tapering of the living shaft, and it appeared to him that a building might be erected on the model of the oak, that would be fully able to resist the action of external violence. Thus thinking, he projected the light-house of Eddystone, which soon proved, amid the tremendous fury of contending elements, that he had not erred in taking nature for his guide. A beech or elm might have suggested the same thought, for in the trunk of every forest-tree the material is so disposed that the greater portion pertains to the base of the column; that part, especially, which rises from the root is thickest, and why is this? not only because a tapering column is far more beautiful than one of equal girth, but because the disturbing force at the top, acts more powerfully on the lower sections, than on the higher. It is needful that the base of the column should be strengthened, and it is equally unnecessary that the top should be of the same thickness as the base. Two purposes are consequently answered. The tree is rendered stronger and more elegant, and a certain portion of material is given to one part, without weakening the other. A tree is, therefore, equally adapted by its construction to resist the fury of the tempest, of that unseen, yet mighty force which comes against it, when the fierce northern blast howls through the forest; as also the load of snow which often presses heavily upon its topmost branches.
There is not throughout the vegetable kingdom a more glorious object than a tree, with its smooth and tapering trunk, and its canopy of mingling boughs. Who can estimate correctly the majesty with which it is invested, or the grace and grandeur of its proportions, and its bulk? The finest trees often grow on mountainous heights, harmonizing with the illimitable expanse of heaven, or surrounded with the wildest extent of forest scenery. Their intrinsic bulk is therefore lessened to the eye, and it is not till they are singled from the surrounding landscape, and subjected to a rule and measure, that an opinion can be formed with respect to their vast size and height. Even then, the certainty often fails to impress the mind, for figures convey but an imperfect conception of length and breadth, of height and girth. Some more familiar illustrations are wanting to prove that many a majestic tree, which is admired among its sylvan brethren, as the proudest ornament of a park or forest, is in reality an enormous mass, which the passer-by would gaze at with awe and admiration, if seen beside the dwellings and the palaces of men; or compared with the moving objects which pass and repass in the streets of a great city. Our native woods often contain noble specimens, of which the bulk is ten or twelve feet in diameter, a width greater by three feet than the carriage-way of Fetter lane, near Temple-bar; and oaks might be named, on the block of which two men could thresh without incommoding one the other. The famous Greendale Oak is pierced by a road, over which it forms a triumphal arch, higher by several inches than the poets’ postern at Westminster Abbey. The celebrated table in Dudley Castle which is formed of a single oaken plank, is longer than the wooden bridge that crosses the lake in the Regent’s park; and the roof of the great hall of Westminster, which is spoken of with admiration on account of its vast span, being unsupported by a single pillar, is little more than one-third the width of the noble canopy of waving branches that are upheld by the Worksop Oak. The massive rafters of the spacious roof rest on strong walls, but the branches of the tree spring from one common centre. Architects can alone estimate the excessive purchase which boughs, of at least one hundred and eighty-nine feet, must have on the trunk into which they are inserted. Those of the Oak of Ellerslie cover a Scotch acre of ground; and in the Three-shire Oak, its branches drip over an extent of seven hundred and seven square yards. The tree itself grows in a nook that is formed by the junction of the three counties of York, Nottingham, and Derby; and as the trunk is so constructed, being tapering and firmly rooted in the earth, in order that it may uphold the boughs and repel the fury of the winds, so are the boughs themselves, made with an especial reference to the purpose for which they are designed. They are much thicker at the place of their insertion in the trunk than at the extremity; that their tendency to break may thus be uniform. We owe to this, the graceful waving of innumerable boughs, here aspiring in airy lightness above the general mass, and there gracefully feathering to the ground, the pleasing murmur of their foliage when rustling in the warm breeze of summer, and the elegant ramifications which are perceptible in winter. But whether seen against the clear blue ether of a winter sky, or presenting a broad and ample breadth of shade; whether raged against by a fierce tempest, or having the foliage gently shaken by playful breezes; the giant resistance in one case, or the ceaseless quiver of the other, owe their power, and their play, to the unseen members of the mighty column which are buried deep within the earth. These, though still, are ever working. Though they cannot move themselves, they move others. They draw up the moisture of the earth and send it, by means of a secret influence on an undiscoverable machinery, which is seen in its effects, though the way in which it operates is entirely unknown, to fill with life the smallest leaf that quivers in the sunbeams, or the tender bud that is not yet emerged from its silken cradle.
They serve likewise to brace the tree within the earth, and they vary according to climate and locality. Take the beech for instance, which flourishes alike in deep valleys, and on windy hills. When growing in a sheltered place the roots are thrown out equally, like rays diverging from a common centre. When standing on an eminence or on a plain, exposed to the action of a wind that blows generally from one quarter, the roots spread out and grapple the firm soil towards the quarter from which the wind comes. In this country it is generally south-west, or west-south-west; hence it happens that when other causes do not interfere, our native trees generally incline their heads to the north-east, and their strongest roots go forth in an opposite direction, for the evident purpose of holding the tree firm, when the storms beat upon it. Trees are, consequently, often uprooted by a sudden squall of wind from the east or north-east, which have withstood the tempests of ages.
The aggregate effect produced by forest scenery is magnificent—the deep retiring woodland, the waving of innumerable branches, the majestic columns which uphold them, the mingled tints and hues, the dancing of the lights and shadows on the ground, the long, long vistas which extend far as the eye can reach, when the view of external nature is shut out, when there is neither a green meadow nor distant hill to be seen, nor even a fence nor railing, nothing which betokens the hand of man; but noble trees around, and a magnificent canopy of mingled boughs; when not a sound is heard except the rustling of the wind in the topmost branches, or perchance the plaintive voice of the ring-dove, which loves to build her nest in solitary places. But the tree, which like the Beech of the Frith Common, stands alone, can best be understood. The mind can rest upon it, and the eye can embrace its beautiful proportions. Wisdom may be gained by him who loves to read the ample page of nature, while musing beneath its branches, for every leaf is an open book, every tender bud tells much concerning the goodness of that Being whose beneficence is equally conspicuous in the smallest, as in the mightiest of created things.
This noble tree grows on a sunny hill side,
And merry birds sing round it all the day long;
Oh the joy of my childhood, at evening tide,
To sit in its shadow and list the birds’ song!
No sound then was heard but the gush of the rill,
Or the woodpecker tapping some hollow beech-tree;
While the sun shed his last purple glow on the hill,
And the last hum was heard of the home-loving bee.
But now far away from that sunny hill side,
’Mid the stir and the din of the proud city’s throng,
I think, is that tree standing yet in its pride?
Are the echoes still woke by the merry birds’ song?
They tell me the woodcutter’s hatchet was heard,
To thin the tall trees where they drooped o’er the lea;
But he marr’d not the home of the wandering bird,
The haunt of my childhood, my own beechen-tree.
May peace in the cot of that woodman abide,
And grateful birds sing to him all the day long,
May his steps long be firm on the sunny hill’s side.
And echo respond to the voice of his song.
I can think of that tree, where no green trees are seen,
’Mid the city’s loud din, for the spirit is free,
And dear to me still is the wild daisied green.
Where thy branches are waving, my own beechen-tree.
