wood well until they attain a certain age, but are perfectly hardy and will probably grow best in the east and south-east of England.
The only large trees I know of in England are two at Kew which grow on the mound near the Cumberland gate and which measure 85 feet by 8 feet 6 inches and 85 feet by 8 feet respectively (Plate 246). There is a tall slender white ash at Croome Court, Worcestershire, crowded by other trees, which measures about 80 feet by 4 feet 6 inches, and another’ at Arley Castle 60 feet by 5 feet 4 inches. There is also a smaller one at Syon. Another at Tortworth was 46 feet by 3 feet in 1907. Loudon says that at St. Anne’s Hill in Surrey there was one 33 feet high which had been planted thirty-six years, and that near London young plants are generally injured by spring frost, which I have not found to be the case at Colesborne.
Sir Charles Strickland tells me that he has planted the tree at Hildenley at Yorkshire, but does not find it succeed so well as the Oregon ash.
A tree at Fota, in the south of Ireland, is 50 feet high and 6 feet in girth.
Cobbett says :* "This tree grows much faster than ours. I have abundant proof, for the American white ash plants which I have at Kensington, which were not sown till last April, are now (1825) full as tall again as any of the English ash of the same age that I ever saw. This, therefore, is above all others the ash which I recommend to be put into plantations in England, whether for ornament, for timber, or for under- wood.” But Cobbett in this case, as in many others, was rather apt to jump to conclusions after too short experience; for if the tree had continued to grow as it did at first, there must by this time have been many good-sized ones in England.
Timber
The timber of the white ash is as highly valued in America as ours is in England for the same purposes, and is largely imported to England where it is used as a substitute for English ash. Laslett in writing of American white ash says: “It is tough, elastic, clean, and straight in the grain, and stands well after seasoning, hence we get from this tree the best material for oars for boats that can be produced. They are much and eagerly sought after by foreign governments as well as our own, and also by the great private steamship companies and mercantile marine. The best quality wood has a clean, bright uniform whitish colour ; the second is slightly stained with red and yellow shades alternating; the third and least valuable quality is that in which the red and yellow colours predominate. It is much slower in growth than the English, and is probably not so durable.” On visiting the principal importers of this wood in Liverpool, I found large quantities of American oars imported ready-made; and was told that the timber had now become so scarce in the east, that it came from the west side of the Mississippi.* I have not been able to procure a sample grown in this country for comparison; but I am indebted to
1 Catalogue of Hardy Trees, Arley Castle, No. 43 (1907).
2 Woodlands, art. 135.
3 A lot of oars which I saw in the Portsmouth Dockyard were stamped on the blade "De Valls Bluff Ark. U.S.A.” I am informed by experienced naval carpenters, and officers, that they believe that English ash, if it can be procured of sufficient straightness and length, would be at least as good, if not better.
