30 MAY 1914, Page 14

THE OAK.

[TO THE EDITOR or rra "SrwrAron."1

Sin,—Let us further sing, to the glory of England's oak, first, that that part of him that could not be cut for the timbers of our ships yet helped to forge the bolts that held them together (the smelting-furnace has given names to many fields and lanes in this country—a land of oaks—lying not far from the iron-fields of Dean Forest); and, secondly, that to this day there is no leather like the leather tanned with oak- bark and time, and nothing else. If a certain strap of the Prince Imperial's harness had been made from Worcester leather, might not France (who knows?) have been an Empire instead of a Republic now P—I am, Sir, etc.,