LORANTHACEiE. 193 



chief exports. Oak-woods and oak-trees border Mistletoe-abounding orchards very 

 generally, and the trees themselves are often mingled in very close alliance ; indeed, it 

 would not be too much to say, from the great abundance of oaks in the vicinity of 

 orchards, that the birds must sow the Mistletoe seeds upon them more frequently than 

 upon any other kind of tree. Nevertheless, so far as is known, there are but two 

 instances of its growth on the oak in Herefoi^dshire, — the one in Eastnor Park, which 

 has been so well known for so many years, and the other in an outlying district of the 

 county at Tedstone Delamere, discovered in 1851. 



Dr. Bull has carefully collected and authenticated all the known instances of the 

 Mistletoe growing upon the oak. Besides those he mentions in Herefordshire, he gives 

 us an oak at Badam's Court, Ledbury Park, near Chepstow ; one at Burningfold Farm, 

 in Surrey ; another near Basingstoke ; and one at Plymouth, — in all only seven 

 instances of the Mistletoe living upon the oak in England, 



" The Mistletoe on the oak," writes an energetic searcher for it in Monmouthshire, 

 " is like a ghost, it vanishes into thin air when you try to grasp it ; everybody has 

 seen it long ago, but the tree is always cut down, or, somehow or other, the result is — 

 nil." Most woodwards will tell you, and in good faith too, that they have seen it, and, 

 indeed, will generally mention the exact tree and the place where it grows, but the 

 result of their further examination has always been the same, — for some cause or other 

 the instance fails, and the Mistletoe can never be shown on the oak. The tree has 

 been felled or blown down, or it may be the isolated bunch of wild ivy or honeysuckle, 

 or a cluster of small oak branches, has deceived them. 



The simple fact of the extreme rarity of oak-fed Mistletoe appears to have given 

 its sanctity in the early days of superstition and darkness. On a tree famous from all 

 antiquity and consecrated in the eai'liest ages — the very name of the priests of religion 

 signifying a connection with oaks and oak-woods, it does not seem unnatural that the 

 tiny plant deriving its life from this venerated tree and growing in a manner almost 

 supernatural, when compared with surrounding vegetation, should have become invested 

 with a mysterious sanctity. 



Pliny writes of our British ancestors : — " The Druids (thus they call their chief 

 priests) hold nothing in greater veneration than the Mistletoe and the tree on which 

 it grows, provided only that it be the oak. They select groves of oak-trees standing by 

 themselves, and perform no sacred ceremonies without green oak-foliage. Indeed, they 

 truly believe that whenever the Mistletoe grows upon the oak it has been sent from 

 heaven, and they consider it a sign of a chosen tree. But the Mistletoe is very rarely 

 found upon the oak. When it is discovered they proceed to collect it with very great 

 devotion and ceremony, and especially on the sixth day of the moon. This period of 

 the moon's age, when it has sufficient size without having attained the half of its 

 fulness, makes the beginning of their months and years, and of an age, which consists 

 but of thirty years." — C. Plinii Nat. Hist. lib. xvi. c. 44. 



The grand ceremony of cutting the Mistletoe from the oak was the New Year's 

 Day festival of the ancient Britons, and it was held on the sixth day of the moon, as 

 near the 10th of March as the age of the moon permitted. The New Year's Day 

 festival of our forefathers would have fallen this present year on the 14th of March. 

 The exact proceedings of the Druids on this great annual festival are thus described by 

 Pliny : — " Calling the Mistletoe, in their manner of speaking, a cure-all (or all-heal), 

 and having got the sacrifices and the good things for the feast all properly ready under 

 the tree, they lead up two white bulls, and begin by tying them by their horns to the tree. 

 The Arch-Drnid clothed in a white robe, then mounts the tree and cuts the Mistletoe 



VOL. IV. 2 c 



