i6o THE FRUITS OF THE COUNTRY-SIDE 



together, and each of these contains one seed. Blackbirds, 

 thrushes, and many other birds devour them with avidity. 

 The human subject will be wise to avoid them, though 

 a couple of centuries ago our forefathers held them in great 

 repute, some ten or twelve being reckoned a dose, and 

 swallowed like pills, for various ailments. Our ancestors 

 would appear to have been of altogether tougher fibre 

 than ourselves, judging by the amount of port wine 

 that they drank, the wall-papers they could live with 

 without flinching. We imagine that in these latter days 

 any one indulging in this wholesale fashion in holly- 

 berries would speedily become the victim of Ilexitis, 

 unless kindly Nature, the berries being strongly emetic 

 in their action, came to his aid, and warned him not to do 

 anything quite so foolish again, lest he became an awful 

 example to the world at large, an interesting case in the 

 text-books, a tender memory to his sorrowing friends. 



Holly is one of the trees that yields bird-Hme for the 

 wiles of the fowler. It was made, according to the author 

 of Jdam in Eden, by " putting the Barke of Holly into 

 a hole made in moist, foggy ground, and covering it with 

 boughs of Trees, and some earth over till it be putrified, 

 which will be within a fortnight : being afterwards beaten 

 in a Mortar it will become thick and clammy, so that 

 the filthinesse being cleared therefrom by often washing, 

 and a little Oyle of Nuts added thereto it will be as good 

 as that which is made of Misseltoe, and being applyed 

 with the Yolke of an Egge to any place that hath any 

 thorn, prick, or Splinter therein it draweth it forth, but 

 it is dangerous to be used inwardly." Why any one should 

 ever think of applying bird-lime internally, to remove a 



