CHAP. C1II.

■JALICA CEJ3.

a’a'lix.

1519

a favourite tree of the doctor’s, and to have attracted his attention for manyyears : indeed, to use his own expression, it was the delight of his early andwaning life; and it is said that he never failed to visit it whenever he wentto Lichfield ; and, during his visit to that city in the year 1781, he desiredDr. Trevor Jones, a physician of that place, to give him a description of it,saying it was by much the largest tree of the kind he had ever seen or heardof, and therefore wished to give an account of it in the Philosophical Trans-actions , that its size might be recorded. Dr. Jones, in compliance with his re-quest, furnished him with the particular dimensions of the tree, which wereas follows: — The trunk rose to the height of 12 ft. S^in., and then dividedinto 15 large ascending branches, which, in very numerous and crowdedsubdivisions, spread at the top in a circular form, not unlike the appearanceof a shady oak, inclining a little towards the east. The circumference ofthe trunk at the bottom was 15 ft. 9^ in.; in the middle, lift. 10 in.; andat the top, immediately below the branches, 13 ft. The entire height of thetree was 49 ft.; and the circumference of the branches, at their extremities,upwards of 200 ft., overshadowing a plane not far short of 4000 ft. Thesurface of the trunk was very uneven, and the bark much furrowed. Thetree had then (Nov. 29. 1781) a vigorous and thriving appearance. Themost moderate computation of its age was, at that time, near fourscore years ;and some respectable authorities were strongly inclined to think that acentury had passed over its head.” The tree stood near the public foot-path in the fields between the city of Lichfield and Stow Hill, the residence,of the celebrated “ Molly Ashton; ” and it is said that Dr. Johnson fre-quently rested under its shade when on his way to the house of that lady,whom he never failed to visit periodically, till a short period before hisdeath. (See Croker’s edition of Boswell’s Johnson.') There is a portrait ofJohnson’s Willow given as a frontispiece to the Salictum Woburnense ; but,as that figure has much more the appearance of a spreading beech than ofa willow of any kind, we were induced to doubt its fidelity. We ac-cordingly made enquiries, through a friend at Lichfield , respecting theoriginal tree; and we have satisfied ourselves that the portrait alluded tobears very little resemblance to what Johnson’s Willow was at any stage ofits growth; or, at least, at any time since the year 1810. (See Gard. Mag.,vol. xii. p. 716 ;andvol. xiii. p. 94.) There are two engravings of Johnson’sWillow in the Gentleman’s Magazine for 1785; one of these, a south-westview of the tree, taken in July, 1785, by Mr. Stringer, and which may be con-sidered as representing the appearance of the tree at Dr. Johnson’s death, iscopied to the reduced scale of 1 in. to 12 ft. in fig. 1312. From this period,the tree appears to have gradually increased in size till April, 1810, when Dr.Withering found the trunk to girt 21ft. at 6 ft. from the ground, and to extend20 ft. in height, before dividing into enormous ramifications : the trunk andbranches were then perfectly sound, and the very extensive head showedunimpaired vigour. In November of the same year, however, many ofthe branches were swept away in a violent storm; and nearly half of whatremained of the tree fell to the ground in August, 1815, leaving little moreton its stupendous trunk, and a few side boughs. We have seen a portraitot the tree by Mr. Stringer, made in 1816, which was kindly lent to us bynat gentleman, by which it appears to have been then considerably muti-lated, and in a state of decay. This decay was accelerated by a fire maclethe hollow of the trunk by some boys, in 1825, and which wou'd pro-ably have consumed the tree, had not Mr. Stringer, whose garden nearlyjoins it, seen flames proceeding from the trunk, and sent some of his men™ e town engine to extinguish the fire. In April, 1829, the tree vasah°"T q °* n * n A - v '°^ ent storm, which took place on the 29th of that month,onth ^ ° C ' oc k ln afternoon. A drawing was taken of the tree as it laye ground,from which a lithograph was published,representing its appear-.Jf ® , e its fall; and from this lithograph fig. 1313. is reduced to the

scaleof lxn. to 12 ft.