THE MISTLETOE. 107 



green and branching. The male plant is fruitful, 

 and the female barren; sometimes, indeed, the male 

 even bears no berry." If this is what Pliny really 

 wrote, he has made a wonderful muddle of the 

 sexes. If we substitute female for male, and vice 

 versa, the statements are correct. PerhajDS some 

 learned scribe in copying sought to amend the his- 

 tory. In chap. 94, he describes the process of 

 making bird-lime. In chap. 95, he treats of the 

 miscellaneous facts connected with the mistletoe. 

 "Upon this occasion we must not omit to mention 

 the admiration which is lavished uj^on this plant by 

 the Gauls. The Druids, for that is the name they 

 give to their wise men (viagos), hold nothing more 

 sacred than the mistletoe and the tree that bears 

 it, supposing that tree to be the oak (robur). Of 

 itself the oak is selected by them to form whole 

 groves, and they perform none of their religious 

 rites without employing branches of it; so nuich so, 

 that it is very iDrobable that the priests themselves 

 may have received their name from the Greek 

 name for that tree." Driis is the Greek for oak ; 

 but that barbarous tribes should call their priests 

 by a name derived from a language unknown to 

 them is absolutely incredible. Yet in this Pliny was 

 perhaps not quite hopelessly astray; as the word 

 Druid, though of Celtic derivation, has as its root the 

 vocable dru (tree), which does not only appear in 

 Greek and in the Celtic languages, but in the Teu- 

 tonic ones as well, and of which our English word 

 tree is a form. "In fact, it is the notion with them 

 that everything that grows on it has been sent im- 

 mediately from heaven, and that the mistletoe on it 

 is a proof that the tree has been selected by God 

 Himself as an object of His especial favour. The 

 mistletoe, hoAvever, is but rarely found on the oak, 

 and, when found, is gathered with rites replete with 

 religious awe." We come to an important passage, 

 and I shall now follow Bohn's translation in the 

 first instance. "This is done more particularly on 



