256 Yew- Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



measuring 26 feet 3 inches at 3 feet from the 

 ground. It has four principal branches, the largest 

 of which measures 5 feet 3 inches in girth at 

 1 6 feet. 



No. 3 measures 20 feet 5 inches at 4 feet from 

 the ground. There are many branches and much 

 spray ; the top is much broken. 



No. 4, Girth about 1 2 feet. 



'At Watcombe, a lone farm on the road from 

 Hungerford to Wantage, there is,' says a writer to 

 the Times (1890), 'a very interesting group of 

 venerable yews, on the site of a cell or grange, 

 with a church attached, belonging in pre-Reforma- 

 tion days to the Benedictine Monastery of Hurley, 

 to which house it may have been given by Geoffrey 

 de Mandeville about 1086, and mentioned in Pipe 

 Rolls as being the charge of a provost in 1 156.' 



These yews are planted in double rows forming 

 alleys. The enclosure from ' time out of mind ' 

 has been known by the country people as ' Paradise.' 

 A pair of yews a little to the rear of Paradise are 

 known as Adam and Eve. They are male and 

 female, ' Adam ' being of a darker shade than his 

 companion ' Eve.' The former measures over 

 9 feet in girth, and the latter 10 feet. Standing 

 alone, at some distance in the background, farthest 

 removed from Paradise, is the ' Serpent' or * Devil.' 

 This tree, the hollow trunk of which is reduced to 

 a shell, but carries a flourishing head measuring 



