2084 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. l»ART III. 



Gray's lines are well known : — 



" Beneath those rugged elms, that yew tree's shade. 

 Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap, 



Each in his narrow cell securely laid, 

 The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep." Elegy in a Country Churchgard. 



Swift makes Baucis and Philemon be turned to yews : — 



" Description would but lire my Muse : 

 In short they both were turned to yews. 

 Old Goodman Dobson of the Green 

 Remembers he the trees has seen. 

 On Sundays, after evening prayer, 

 He gathers all the parish there ) 

 Points out the place of either yew 

 Here Baucis, there Philemon grew. 

 Till once the parson of our town, 

 To mend his barn, cut Baucis down ; 

 .Vt which 't is hard to be believed 

 How much the other tree was grieved. 

 Grew scrubbed, died a top, was stunted ; 

 So the next parson stubb'd and burnt it." 



Numerous other passages might be quoted, but we shall confine our- 

 selves to two, one of which is from Sir Walter Scott, and the other from 

 Wordsworth : — 



" But here 'twixt rock and river grew 



A dismal glove of sable yew. 



With whose sad tints were mingled seen 



The blighted (ir's sepulchral green : 



Setni'd that the trees their shadows cast 



The earth that nourish'd them to blast. 



For never knew that sAvarthy grove 



The verdant hue that fairies love ; 



Nor wilding green, nor woodland flower. 



Arose within its baleful bower : 



The dark and sable earth receives 



Its only carj)et from the leaves. 



That, trom the withering branches cast, 



Bestrew'd the ground with every blast." Kokcbi/, canto, li. 



" There is a yew tree, pride of Lorton x'ale. 



Which to this day stands single in the midst 



Of its own darkness, as it stood of yore, 



Not loth to furnish weapons in the hands 



Of Umfraville or Percy, ere they march'd 



To Scotland's heaths, or those that cross'd the sea. 



And drew their sounding bows at Agincourt j 



Perhaps at earlier Cressy, or Poictiers. 



Of vast circumference and gloom profound. 



This solitary tree! A living thing, 



Produced too slowly ever to decay ; 



Of form and aspect too magnificent 



To be destroy'd. But worthier still of note 



Are those fraternal four of Borrowdale, 



Join'd in one solemn and capacious grove;] 



Huge trunks ! and each particular trunk a growth 



Of intertwisted fibres serpentine, 



Upcoiling, and immediately convolved : 



Nor uninform'd by phantasy, and looks 



That threaten the profane; a pillar'd shade. 



Upon whose grassless floor of red brown hue. 



By sheddings from the pining umbrage tinged 



Perennially ; — beneath whose sable roof 



Of boughs, as if for festal purpose, deck'd 



With unrejoicing berries, ghostly shapes 



May meet at noontide, 



there to celebrate. 



As in a natural temple, scatter'd o'er 

 With altars undisturb'd of mossy stone. 

 United worship." 



There does not appear to be any mythological legend connected with the 

 yew. In Lempriere's Classical Dictionary, it is said that Smilax was meta- 

 morphosed into a yew ; but Ovid simply says that she, and her lover Crocus, 

 were changed into two flowers : — 



" Et Crocon in parvos versum cum Smilace flores 

 Praetereo; dulcique animos novitate tenebo." Met, lib. iv. fab. 10. 



Probably the mistake arose from Dioscorides, and some of the other 

 ancient botanists, having called the yew Smilax. Cambden relates a legend 



