THE MISTLETOE IN HEREFORDSHIRE. 871 
* Have I not reason to look pale ? 
These two have ’ticed me to this place ; 
A barren, detested vale you see it is: 
The trees, though Summer, yet forlorn and lean, 
O’ercome with Moss, and baleful Mistletoe.” 
Dr. Harley has well described the effects of the Mistletoe on the 
supporting branch, and the struggle for life between them. 
III.— OCCURRENCE ON THE OAK. 
The Viscum album but rarely “ gains a settlement” on the Oak,— 
. as seldom in our own day as in the Druidical times of old, when its 
very rarity heightened the veneration with which it was regarded when 
found. ** Est autem id rarum admodum inventum, et repertum magna 
religione petitur," says Pliny. In an excellent note by Dr. Giles in 
his translation of ‘Richard of Cirencester’ (p. 432), he gives the 
opinion of Dr. Daubeny, that Mistletoe-growing Oaks were extermi- 
nated after the Druids were destroyed (N. & Q. vol. ii). It is 
highly probable that this was the case, but sinee all their Oaks too 
have gone centuries since, it can make no difference as to its occurrence 
at the present time. Whatever may be the conditions necessary for 
the germination and growth of the Mistletoe on the Oak, they must 
be such as rarely coincide, or it certainly would be much more common 
in this county. Oak may be considered the weed of Herefordshire. 
Oak-timber and Oak-bark form two of our 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. Never- 
theless, so far as is known, there are but two instanees of its growth 
on the Oak in Herefordshire,—the one in Eastnor Park, whieh 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. 
The occurrence of the Mistletoe on the Oak is at once so rare and 
so interesting, that I have not confined myself to this eounty in my in- 
quiries about it, but ascertained its existence, at the present time, m all 
the instances which have been recorded as occurring in England. The 
following I have well authenticated :— 
