102 TREES IN NATURE, MYTH & ART 



*' He that in winter should behold some of our 

 highest hills in Surrey clad with whole woods of 

 these two last sort of trees, for divers miles in 

 circuit, (as in those delicious groves of them, 

 belonging to the Honourable my noble friend 

 Sir Adam Brown of Beech- worth Castle, from 

 Box-hill, and near our famous mole or swallow) 

 might without the least violence to his imagina- 

 tion, easily fancy himself transported into some 

 new or enchanted country ; for, if in any spot 

 of England, 



Hie ver perpetuum, atque alienis mensibus aestas. 



— 'Tis here 

 Eternal spring, and summer all the year." 



Two modern literary references to the char- 

 acter of the yew-tree may not be passed over 

 here. The first is Wordsworth's poem de- 

 scriptive of the "Yew-tree, pride of Lorton 

 Vale," and those "worthier still of note," the 



fraternal four of Borrowdale, 

 Joined in one solemn and capacious grove ; 

 Huge trunks ! and each particular trunk a growth 

 Of intertwisted fibres serpentine 

 Up-coiling, and inveterately convolved ; 

 Nor uninformed with Phantasy, and looks 

 That threaten the profane ; — a pillared shade. 

 Upon whose grassless floor of red-brown hue, 



