ig2 pPant "bore, "becrc^/, an si "b^rle/, 



funereal tree, whose branches it was at one time usual to carry- 

 in solemn procession to the grave, and afterwards to deposit 

 therein under the bodies of departed friends. The custom of 

 planting Yew trees singly in churchyards is also one of consider- 

 able antiquity. Statins, in his sixth Thebaid, calls it the solitary 

 Yew. Leyden thus apostrophises this funeral tree : — 



" Now more I love thee, melancholy Yew, 

 Whose still green leaves in silence wave 

 Above the peasant's rude unhonoured grave, 

 Which oft thou moistenest with the morning dew. 

 To thee the sad. to thee the weary fly ; 

 They rest in peace beneath thy sacred gloom, 

 Thou sole companion of the lonely tomb ; 

 No leaves but thine in pity o'er them siyh : 

 Lo ! now to fancy's gaze thou seem'st to spread 

 Thy shadowy boughs to shroud me with the dead." 



The Mountain Ash is to be found in most Welsh churchyards, 

 where it has been planted, not as a funeral tree, but as a defence 

 against evil spirits. In Montgomeryshire, it is customary to rest 

 the corpse on its way to the churchyard under one of these trees 

 of good omen. 



William Cullen Bryant, the American poet, has left us a 

 graceful description of an English churchyard : — 



"Erewhile on England's pleasant shores, our sires 

 Left not their churchyards unadorned with shades 

 Or blossoms ; and, indulgent to the strong 

 And natural dread of man's last home — the grave ! 

 Its frost and silence, they disposed around. 

 Too sadly on life's clo-e, the forms and hues 

 Of vegetable beauty. Then the Yew, 

 Green even amid the snows of Winter, told 

 Of immortality ; and gracefully 

 The Willow, a perpetual mourner, drooped ; 

 And there the gadding Woodbine crept about ; 

 And there the ancient Ivy." 



The Walnut-tree, of which it is said that the shadow brings 

 death, is in some countries considered a funeral tree. In India 

 they call the Tamarisk, Yamadutika (Messenger of Yama, the 

 Indian god of death), and the Bomhax Heptaphyllum, Yamadruma, the 

 tree of Yama. 



The Elm and the Oak, although not stricflly funeral trees, are 

 connedted with the grave by reason of their wood being used in 

 the construction of coffins, at the present day, just as Cypress 

 and Cedar wood used to be employed by the ancients. 



" And well the abounding Elm may grow 

 In field and hedye so rife ; 

 In forest, copse, and wooded park, 



And 'mid the city's strife ; 

 For every hour that passes by 

 Shall end a human life." — Hood. 



