46 THE FRUITS OF THE COUNTRY-SIDE 



It has long been a problem whether the ivy that we 

 think, and rightly so, so picturesque when we see it 

 ascending a tree-trunk, was inflicting injury upon its host 

 or not, and the general impression was that such a 

 mantling was hurtful. Tusser, in his quaint old book 

 on husbandry, says, 



Let luy be killed, 



Else tree will be spilled, 



This spilling is merely a sacrifice to the exigencies of 

 rhyme, and if we read the last word as " spoilt " we shall 

 probably get to the plain prose of the matter as it 

 presented itself to the old writer. Elsewhere he writes : 



Where luie imbraceth the tree verie sore 

 Kill luie, or else tree will addle no more. 



If for " addle " we substitute " add on " we get the meaning, 

 that the tree too tightly swathed in the grip of the ivy is 

 unable to grow healthily, and cannot increase its bulk. The 

 old idea was that the ivy was a parasite, stealing nourishment 

 by its rootlets from the tree that it embraced,^ but there 

 seems to be really no more reason to suppose that these 

 so-called rootlets on the stems rob the tree of its vitality, 

 than that sweet-peas or other tendril-bearing flowers rob 

 of their life-juices any plants to which they may be found 

 clinging. In each case the mischief which may arise, and 

 which sometimes does arise, is mechanical, the mischief 

 that arises from over-pressure, from the denial of air, 



' Ivy hath a thick wooddy Trunk or Body sometimes as big as one's 

 arm, usually climbing up Trees, and by the small Roots it sendeth into 

 them, draweth nourishment from them, many times to their bane and utter 

 ruin. — Adam in Eden, 1657. 



