It is called _King's Oak_: it was
William the Conqueror's favorite tree. _Herne's Oak_ in Windsor Park, is
said by some to be still standing, but it is described as a mere
anatomy.
----An old oak whose boughs are mossed with age,
And high top bald with dry antiquity.
_As You Like it_.
"It stretches out its bare and sapless branches," says Mr. Jesse, "like
the skeleton arms of some enormous giant, and is almost fearful in its
decay." _Herne's Oak_, as every one knows, is immortalised by
Shakespeare, who has spread its fame over many lands.
There is an old tale goes that Herne the hunter,
Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest,
Doth all the winter time, at still midnight,
Walk round about an oak, with great ragg'd horns,
And there he blasts the trees, and takes the cattle;
And makes milch cows yield blood, and shakes a chain
In a most hideous and dreadful manner.
You have heard of such a spirit; and well you know,
The superstitious, idle-headed eld
Received, and did deliver to our age,
This tale of Herne the Hunter for a truth.
_Merry Wives of Windsor_.
"Herne, the hunter" is said to have hung himself upon one of the
branches of this tree, and even,
----Yet there want not many that do fear,
In deep of night to walk by this Herne's Oak.
_Merry Wives of Windsor_.
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