Old Yew Trees.

—Decandolle finds, as the result of his inquiries, that of all European species of trees the yew is that which attains the greatest age.

He assigns to the yew (Taxus baccata) of Braborne, in the county of Kent, thirty centuries; to the Scotch yew of Fortingal, from twenty-five to twenty-six; and to those of Crowhurst, in Surrey, and Ripon, in Yorkshire, respectively, fourteen and a half and twelve centuries.

(Decandolle de la longevite des arbres, p. 65.)

Endlicher remarks that the age of another yew tree in the churchyard of Gresford, in North Wales, which measures 52 English feet in circumference below the branches, is estimated at 1,400 years; and that of a yew in Derbyshire, at 2,096 years.

In Lithuania, lime trees have been cut down which were eighty-seven English feet in circumference, and in which 810 annual rings have been counted.— Humboldt’s Aspects of Nature.