1. _Robur_, the oak; I have sometimes consider’d it very seriously, what should move _Pliny_ to make a whole chapter of one only line, which is less than the argument alone of most of the rest in his huge volume: but the weightiness of the matter does worthily excuse him, who is not wont to spare his words, or his reader. _Glandiferi maximè generis omnes, quibus honos apud Romanos perpetuus._ “Mast-bearing-trees were principally those which the Romans held in chiefest repute,” lib. 16. cap. 3. And in the following where he treats of chaplets, and the dignity of the civic coronet; it might be compos’d of the leaves or branches of any oak, provided it were a bearing tree, and had acorns upon it, and was (as{31:1} _Macrobius_ tells us). Recorded among the _felices arbores_; but this φυλλινὸν ϛέφανον was interwoven, and twisted with thorns and briars; and the garland carried to usher the bride to her husband’s house, intimating that happy state was not exempt from its pungencies and cares. It is then for the esteem which these wise and glorious people had of this tree above all others, that I will first begin with the oak; and indeed it carries it from all other timber whatsoever, for building of ships in general, and in particular being tough, bending well, strong and not too heavy, nor easily admitting water. 2. ’Tis pity that the several kinds of oak are so rarely known amongst us, that whereever they meet with _quercus_, they take it promiscuously for our common oak; as likewise they do Δρὺς, which comprehends all mast-bearing trees whatsoever, (which I think they have no latin word for): And in the _Silva Glandifera_ were reckon’d the chessnut, ilix, _esculus_, _cerris_, _suber_, &c. various species rather than different trees, white, red, black, &c. among our American plantations, (especially the long-stalked oak not as yet much taken notice of): we shall here therefore give an account of four only; two of which are most frequent with us; for we shall say little of the _cerris_ or _ægilops_, goodly to look on, but for little else: Some have mistaken it for beech, whereas indeed it is a kind of oak bearing a small round acorn almost covered with the cup, which is very rugged, the branches loaded with a long moss hanging down like dishevell’d hair which much annoys it. Φάγος is indeed doubtless a species of oak; however by the Latins usually apply’d to the beech, whose leaf exceedingly differs from that of the oak, as also the mast and bark rugged, and growing among the hills and mountains; the other in the valleys, and perhaps, but few of them in Italy. Physicians, naturalists and botanists should therefore be curious how they describe and place such trees mention’d by _Theophrastus_ and others, under the same denomination as frequently they do; being found so very different when accurately examin’d. There is likewise the _esculus_, which though _Vitruvius_, _Pliny_, _Dalcampius_ and others take for a smaller kind, _Virgil_ celebrates for