222 Transactions of the [Sess. 



vented by means of an iron rail which now surrounds the sacred 

 object." We now come to the period when the ' New Statistical 

 Account of Scotland' was written. The notice here given in 1838 

 by the Rev. Robert Macdonald, the late minister of the parish, 

 carries the history of this Yew back to a century earlier. He 

 says : " At the commencement of my incumbency, 32 years ago" 

 — that is, in 1806 — " there lived in the village of Kirktown a man 

 of the name of Donald Robertson, then aged upwards of 80 years, 

 who declared that when a boy going to school" — say in 1736, 

 when Donald would be ten years of age — " he could hardly enter 

 between the two parts " — this being just what Dr Irvine's mother 

 said fifty years later. " Now a coach-and-four," he adds, " might 

 pass between them ; and the dilapidation was partly occasioned by 

 the boys of the village kindling their fire of Bealltuinn at its root. 

 It is now from 52 to 56 feet in circumference." It is to be premised 

 that the boys climbed over the enclosure to kindle their Beltane 

 fire ; but an eight-feet wall to a young Celt would not be an insur- 

 mountable difficulty. 



Lastly, we come to the observations of Sir Robert Christison, 

 as given in the 'Transactions of the Botanical Society' for 1879, 

 and to which we would refer any who may wish fuller information 

 as to the increment of Yews at different ages, with proper systems 

 of measurement, &c. The Professor's observations are so minute 

 and explicit — being also accompanied by drawings of the tree and 

 a ground-plan of the enclosure — that in after-ages, if the tree still 

 survives, there can be no difficulty in drawing comparisons as to 

 its relative conditions. As we have said. Sir Robert's main object 

 was to discover the probable age of the tree, and the conclusion 

 arrived at by him is so astounding that we give it in his own 

 words. He says : " The tree, in the first place, may be assumed 

 to have attained a girth of 22 feet in a thousand years. After that 

 age, no information yet got warrants a rate of more than an inch 

 in 35 years. Taking the lowest measurement of Barrington at 52 

 feet, the difference will thus add 2000 years to the age of the 

 Fortingall Yew, making it in all 3000 years old when measured 

 in 1768-69. The result is startling, but not so improbable as may 

 at first sight be thought, if it be considered that several English 

 Yews of scarcely half the girth are, not without good reason, held 

 to surpass materially a thousand years of age, yet still appear to 

 be in vigorous health, and steadily increasing ; and that upwards 

 of 3000 rings have been actually counted on the stump-surface of 

 a Californian Sequoia." This is the result, then, of Professor Chris- 

 tison's laborious and careful measurements — -viz., that the Fortin- 

 gall Yew has now attained the truly venerable age of 3117 years ! 

 It is therefore held to be proved that the Yew is indigenous, see- 

 ing it thus existed in our country " before the earliest records." It 



