ROYAL OAK, a fair spreading tree at Boscombe, in the parish of Dunnington in Staffordshire, the boughs whereof were once covered with ivy; in the thick of which king Charles II. sat in the day time with colonel Careless, and in the night lodged in Boscombe house: so that they are mistaken who speak of it as an old hollow oak, it being then a gay flourishing tree, surrounded with many more. The poor remains thereof are now fenced in with a handsome wall, with this inscription over the gate in gold-letters: Felicissimum arborum quam in alyum potentissimi regis Caroli II. Deus op. max. per quem reges regnant, hic crescere voluit, &c.