by Charles II., who used to visit and stay at Rufford, where his rooms are now known as “the King’s rooms.” Its stump is now surrounded by iron railings and labelled “Cedrus Libani, planted by King Charles II.”
Loudon considered that the cedars at Chelsea’ mentioned by Sir Hans Sloane in 1685 as then existing (Ray's Letters, p. 176), but now dead, and those at Chiswick House, which are still flourishing, were the oldest in England. But I am informed by Mr. Challis, gardener to the Earl of Pembroke at Wilton House, that “in the year 1874 a very large cedar was cut down there, whose stem up to about 18 feet from the ground was nearly uniform in size, and then divided into twelve distinct branches, each nearly equal in size to a good-sized tree, some of them extending horizontally 70 feet from the trunk. The circumference of the bole five feet from the ground was 36 feet, a transverse section measured when down 11 feet 9 inches, and the number of concentric rings, after several careful counts, some of the rings being somewhat indistinct, was 236. A section of this stem was sent to the South Kensington Museum.”
If this is correct, and it seems to me that the exact statement of so experienced a gardener as Mr. Challis cannot be questioned, the tree must have been introduced in 1638, before Evelyn’s time, and was not only the oldest but also the largest cedar on record in England. I have taken great pains to verify this statement by seeing the section mentioned ; but though careful search has been made in the Records of the British Museum (Natural History), as well as at the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington, and in the letter books of the Royal Horti- cultural Society, this wonderful specimen cannot now be traced or discovered.
Cultivation
The seeds of the cedar, whether imported or home grown, should be sown under glass in the spring; for though they will germinate in the open air, their growth is so slow for the first three or four years that much time and loss will be saved by protecting them with a frame. If sown in pots they should be planted out in a frame at a year old, as the roots soon become cramped and pot-bound, and the young plants do not make good roots for some time if they have once been so checked. At two or three years old they may be planted in rich soil about the beginning of May when the buds are starting, and will require some years more in the nursery before finally planting them out.
The Lebanon cedar requires a warm, deep, well-drained soil to bring it to perfection, and does not grow so well in the colder and moister parts of England. When once established it will endure our most severe winters without much injury, though it often suffers from heavy snowstorms, which break the branches. The seedlings vary considerably in habit, in vigour, and in colour, and as they do not bear pruning well when the branches become large, it is best to cut off the lower ones when quite small, so as to encourage an upright growth.
1 The last of the cedars in the Physic Garden at Chelsea, which had been dead for some years, was removed in 1904. In 1882 it was 60 feet high and 13 feet 9 inches in girth at 3 feet from the ground. Gard. Chron. xxxv. pp. 185, 224 (1904). Cf. also ibid. xxvi. 336, f. 70 (1886), where a figure of the tree is given.
