62 
SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 
TAXACEA. 
now recognized being only distinguishable by trivial leaf-characters and by habit. Four species are 
found in North America; one,’ the type of the genus, is widely distributed through Europe, northern 
Africa, and Asia, and another” is confined to western continental Asia and Japan. 
1 Taxus baccata, Linneus, Spec. 1040 (1753). — De Candolle, 
Lamarck Fl. Frang. ed. 3, iii. 280.— Spach, Hist. Vég. xi. 292, t. 
132. — Ledebour, Fl. Ross. iii. 666. — Reichenbach, Icon. Fl. Ger- 
man. xi. 7, t. 5388. — Hartig, Forst. Culturpfl. Deutschl. 92, t. 9. — 
Willkomm & Lange, Prodr. Fl. Hispan. i. 23.— Parlatore, Fi. 
Ttal. iv. 95; De Candolle Prodr. xvi. pt. ii. 500.— Boissier, 7. 
Orient. v. 711.— Franchet, Nouv. Arch. Mus. sér. 2, v. 293 (Pl. 
David. i.). — Conwentz, Abhand. Landesk. Prov. Westpreussen, ili. 
1, t. 1, 2 (Die Eibe in Westpreussen). — Hempel & Wilhelm, 
Béume und Striiucher, i. 198, £. 117, 118, t. 11. 
Taxus lugubris, Salisbury, Prodr. 396 (1796). 
Taxus nucifera, Wallich, Tent. Fl. Nepal. 57, t. 44 (not Lin- 
neus) (1826). 
Taxus polyplea, Spadoni, Xilolog. iii. 195 (1828). 
Taxus Wallichiana, Zucearini, Abhand. Akad. Miinch. iii. 803, 
t. 5 (Beir. Morphologie der Coniferen) (1837-43). 
? Taxus baccata, var. microcarpa, Maximowicz, Mém. Sav. Etr. 
Acad. Sci. St. Pétersbourg, ix. 259 (Prim. Fl. Amur.) (1859). 
Taxus orientalis, Bertoloni, Misc. Bot. xxiv. 17, t. 2 (1862). 
Taxus baccata, which usually grows in shady situations on the 
northern slopes of hills or under the shade of deciduous-leaved 
trees, and is rarely gregarious, sometimes attains a height of a 
hundred feet, with a tall straight trunk five or six feet in diameter, 
but is usually much smaller and of a bushy habit ; it is widely dis- 
tributed over western and central Europe and the mountains of 
southern Europe and northern Africa, reaching southern Scandina- 
via on the north, and ranging through western Asia to the temper- 
ate Himalayas, where it is common, especially in the northwest 
provinces, up to elevations of 10,000 or 12,000 feet above the sea- 
level and probably attains its largest size, and to northern China 
and Manchuria. 
The wood of Taxus baccata is strong and hard, with a fine close 
grain, and is flexible, elastic, and easy to split ; it is of a handsome 
orange-red or dark red-brown color, with thin almost white sap- 
wood, and is little affected by contact with the soil or atmosphere. 
From the time of the ancients the wood of Taxus baccata has been 
valued in the manufacture of bows, which, for centuries after the 
Anglo-Saxon conquest, were the principal weapons of the English, 
and before the introduction of firearms Yew wood was largely 
imported into England from southern Europe. (See Hansard, 
The Book of Archery, 325.) The wood is considered more valuable 
than that of any other European tree for cabinet-making, and is 
largely used for this purpose in the form of veneers; it is also 
made into boxes, vases, musical instruments, and whip handles, and 
is employed for fence-posts, stakes, and palings. 
In some of the districts of northwestern India the Yew is vener- 
ated, and its wood is burned as incense ; in other parts of India 
its branches are sometimes carried in religious processions, and are 
used for the decoration of houses during religious festivals. The 
powdered bark is mixed with tea, and is employed as a red dye ; it 
is sometimes utilized in the treatment of rheumatism; and the 
powdered leaves are used as a tonic and as an expectorant in the 
treatment of catarrh. The sweet covering of the seed is eaten by 
the mountaineers of northwestern India, and domestic animals 
browse on the leaves and branches. (See Brandis, Forest Fl. Brit. 
Ind. 541.— Gamble, Man. Indian Timbers, 413. — Balfour, Cyclo- 
pedia of India, ed. 3, iii. 827.) 
In North America 
Of slow growth, Taxus baccata attains a great age, and the 
oldest trees in Europe are believed to be Yew-trees, which appear 
occasionally to live under favorable conditions for more than a 
thousand years. (See De Candolle, Bibl. de Gencve, xlvii. 30 [No- 
tice sur la Longévit’ des Arbres].— Bowman, Mag. Nat. Hist. n. 
ser. i. 28, 85.) In England Yew-trees have been planted for cen- 
turies in the neighborhood of churches or have influenced the selec- 
tion of their sites, and some of these venerable Yews with enormous 
stems and broad picturesque heads of dark foliage were ancient 
trees when Columbus was born. (See Strutt, Sylva Britannica, 12, 
t. 21.— Bree, Mag. Nat. Hist. vi. 47, f£.— Loudon, Arb. Brit. iv. 
2073. — Selby, Brit. Forest Trees, 368.) 
During the seventeenth century Yew-trees, which can endure 
an annua! shortening of the branches, were cut into all sorts of 
fantastic shapes to decorate the gardens of France, England, and 
Holland, and were largely employed in forming hedges, for which 
purpose they are admirably adapted and still frequently used. 
In the eastern United States Taxus baccata flourishes south of 
Cape Cod, and was probably mtroduced early in the eighteenth 
century, as large specimens are not uncommon in the neighborhood 
of New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. 
A number of abnormal forms of Taxus baccata have appeared. 
The most distinct of them is the Florence Court or Irish Yew 
(Taxus baccata fastigiata, Loudon, 1. c. 2066, f. 1981 [1838]), distin- 
guished by its upright branches and its larger leaves, which are 
spirally disposed and not distichous, as in the common form. The 
plants of this variety are all female, and have been propagated 
from one of two trees found during the last century on the moun- 
tains of County Fermanagh, in Ireland, and planted in the garden 
of Florence Court, a seat of the Earl of Enniskillen. (See Gard. 
Chron. 1873, 1336.) 
Taxus baccata Dovastonii (Carriére, Rev. Hort. 1861, 175, f.), 
distinguished by its long pendulous branchlets and by the color and 
size of its leaves, which are longer and darker than those of the 
type, was purchased as a seedling from a peddler and planted by 
Mr. John Dovaston about one hundred and twenty years ago in his 
garden in Westfelton, near Shrewsbury, in England. It is a hand- 
some ornamental tree, now common in gardens. (See Loudon, l. c. 
2068, f. 1990.) 
A dwarf Yew (Taxus baccata adpressa, Carriére, Traité Conif. 
520 [1855]), with numerous spreading branches, distinguished by 
its short broad leaves, and known in plants of one sex only, is also 
frequently cultivated. Its origin has not been determined, but, 
although believed at one time to have been introduced from China 
or Japan, it is more probably a seedling form of Taxus baccata 
raised in some European nursery. Other seedling forms of dwarf 
or otherwise unusual habit, or with yellow or silvery leaves, are 
common in cultivation, and are prized by the admirers of abnormal 
plant-forms. (See Carriére, l. c.ed. 2, 731. — Gordon, Pinetum, ed. 2, 
388. — Veitch, Man. Conif. 301. — Beissner, Handb. Nadelh. 169.) 
2 Taxus cuspidata, Siebold & Zuccarini, Abhand. Akad. Miinch. 
iv. pt. ii, 232 (1846); Fl. Jap. ii. 62, t. 128.— Endlicher, Syn. 
Conif. 243. — Miquel, Ann. Mus. Lugd. Bat. iii. 169 (Prol. Fl. 
Jap.). — Parlatore, De Candolle Prodr. xvi. pt. ii. 502. — Franchet 
& Savatier, Enum. Pl. Jap. i. 472. — Masters, Jour. Linn. Soc. 
xviii. 499 (Conifers of Japan). — Miyabe, Mem. Bost. Soc. Nat. 
Hist. iv. 261 (Fl. Kurile Islands). 
