OAK

(Germ, eiche.) The general name of a well known hard-wooded forest tree, much cultivated for the purposes of timber, particularly in ship-building, and in other cases when much exposure to the weather is required. There are several varieties of this valuable tree; but the common English oak (Quercus robur) claims precedence of every other. The oak timber imported from America is very inferior to that of this country: the oak from the central parts of Europe is also inferior, especially in compactne and resistance of cleavage. The knotty oak of England, the "unwedgeable and gnarled oak," as Sliakspeare called it, when cut down at a proper age (from 50 to 70 years), is the best timber known. Some timber is harder, some more difficult to rend, and some le capable of being broken acro ; but none contains all the three qualities in so great and equal proportions; and thus, for at once supporting a weight, resisting a strain, and not splintering by a cannon shot, the timber of the oak is superior to every other. A fine oak is one of the most picturesque of trees: it conveys to the mind a ociations of strength nnd duration which are very impre ive. The oak stands up against fho blast, and does not take, like other trees, a twisted form from the action of the winds. Except the cedar of Lebanon, no tree is so remarkable for the stoutne of its limbs; they do not exactly spring from the trunk, but divide from it, and thus it is sometimes difficult to know which is stem and which is branch. The twisted branches of the oak, too, add greatly to its beauty; and the horizontal direction of its boughs, spreading over a large surface, completes the idea of its sovereignty over all the trees of the forest. [s. 854]