i8qi-9 2 -] The Sacred Plant of the Druids. 21 



among them. Pliny tells us that the sacrecl plant of the 

 Druids grew on the oak. Now the mistletoe, which is asso- 

 ciated with the English festival of Yule, does not grow on the 

 oak. It generally grows on the crab-apple tree, hut it is also 

 found occasionally on the thorn, poplar, willow, ash, maple, 

 and lime. It never grows on the oak, except in the Edin- 

 burgh Botanic Garden, where a plant has with difficulty been 

 made to grow artificially on the oak ; but it never does so 

 naturally. The word " mistletoe " is Saxon, not Celtic, and is 

 connected with the name of the bird, the missel-thrush. 



What, then, was the sacred plant of the Druids, cut by 

 them from oak-trees in summer or autumn ? I have not the 

 slightest doubt that it was the Beef-steak fungus (Fistulina 

 hepatica), which never grows on any tree except the oak, or 

 the chestnut, which is a near botanical ally of the oak. Dr 

 William Craig of Edinburgh lately read a paper to the Botani- 

 cal Society on one which grew on a chestnut in his garden ; 

 but to see this plant growing in perfection all interested ought 

 to visit Lockwood, near Moffat, in the month of September. 

 The old oaks are covered with magnificent specimens. The 

 plant, when cut, pours out a fluid like blood, and the Druids 

 no doubt worshipped it on that account. Csesar tells us that 

 human sacrifices were common in Gaul, and the Druids seem 

 to have thought that the blood of this plant was pleasing to 

 their savage gods, just as the blood of human beings was pleas- 

 ing to them. If the Druids were also cannibals, they no doubt 

 ate the plant, as they perhaps ate the flesh of their human 

 victims. They certainly ate the flesh of the beasts they sacri- 

 ficed. The Beef-steak fungus is perfectly edible. I have eaten 

 it, and rather like it, although it is not so nice as the delicious 

 Hydnum repandum, or even as the Cantharellus cibarius — the 

 best and second-best of edible fungi found in Scotland. I can- 

 not believe that anybody ever ate the mistletoe, and Frazer, in 

 his " Golden Bough," has shown us that no sacrifice was com- 

 plete unless the priest and worshippers ate the victim. The 

 English mistletoe was a mere tribute or present to the gods. 

 The Beef-steak fungus was emblematic of a true sacrifice ; and 

 Caesar, who tells us in Book VI., chap. 15, that the Gauls 

 sacrificed human beings to the gods, tells us in chap. 19 that 

 the Germans offered no sacrifices of any kind. We have the 



