CHAP. cxn. TAXA'CK.*;. TA'XUS. 2089 



properly enough, gives a preference to some soft pleasant tint, in opposition 

 to a glaring bold one ; but, when colours act in concert (as is the case in all 

 scenery), red, blue, yellow, light green, or dingy green, are all alike: the 

 virtue of each consists solely in its agreement with its neighbours." (For. 

 Seen., i. p. 101.) 



The poisonous Nature of the Yew Tree has been known (as we have seen in 

 p. 2069.) since the time of Theophrastus, though some are of opinion that the 

 yew of the ancients was a species of cypress. A mass of evidence, however, 

 proves that the yew of the moderns is generally poisonous in its branches and 

 leaves, though the berries may be eaten with perfect safety. The leaves were 

 formerly thought a cure for worms in children ; but Dr. Percival of Man- 

 chester, in his Medical and Philosophical Essays, relates a melancholy circum- 

 stance of three children being poisoned by their mother's giving them yew 

 leaves for this purpose. The children first took a spoonful of the dried leaves, 

 equally divided among them, and mixed with brown sugar, and afterwards 

 ate a mess of porridge with sour buttermilk. From this dose they experienced 

 no bad effect : but, two days afterwards, the mother, finding the worms still 

 troubled them, administered a dose of the fresh leaves, giving them afterwards 

 a mess of nettle pottage ; that is, gruel with young nettles boiled in it ; and in 

 a few hours the children were all dead. They appeared to have suffered no 

 pain, and, after death, looked as though they were in a placid sleep. A young 

 lady and her servant, in Sussex, who had drunk a decoction of yew leaves by 

 mistake for rue, died in the same manner ; and several other instances are 

 related of their proving fatal to human beings. There are instances of horses 

 and cows having been poisoned by eating the branches of the yew ; and sheep 

 have been killed by browsing upon the bark of the tree ; but goats, deer, and 

 turkeys are said to eat the leaves without being injured by them. In the 

 New Planter's Kalendar, it is stated, that, though the yew has been cried down 

 as a standard in pasture ground, on account of the poisonous nature of the 

 leaves, yet there are many yew trees in pastures, not fenced round, and also 

 hedges, which are uniformly browsed by sheep and cattle without doing 

 them any injury whatever. Hanbury relates a story of seven or eight cattle 

 " having died in consequence of having eaten the half-dried clippings of a yew 

 tree or hedge, which the gardener had thrown over the wall ; by which it would 

 appear that the leaves and twigs, when dried or half-dried, and when taken 

 into the stomach in considerable quantities, have a very different effect from 

 what they have when taken in small quantities when green." Marshall has 

 seen extensive yew plantations, into which cattle were admitted without any 

 evil consequence to themselves, though the trees were browsed to the very 

 bough. Sheep, he says, are particularly fond of the leaves, and, when the 

 ground is covered with snow, will stand upon their hind legs, and devour them 

 as high as they can reach. 



In the Dictionnaire des Eaux et Forets, the subject of the poisonous nature 

 of the yew is discussed at great length. The young shoots, it is allowed, are 

 poisonous both to men and animals, acting like other acrid poisons, by pro- 

 ducing inflammation and spasms ; the antidotes to which are oily substances. 

 In 1753, several horses having entered into a garden near Bois le Due, in Dutch 

 Brabant, ate some of the branches of this tree, and died four hours afterwards, 

 without any other symptoms than spasms, which continued for several 

 minutes. A similar instance is related by Varennes de Fenilles respecting a 

 company of cavalry horses, during the war in Germany, which had been tied 

 to some yews, and had eaten of them. Valmont de Bouare mentions that 

 an ass, which had been fastened to a hedge of yews near the Jardin des 

 Plantes, after eating a few of the branches, instantly expired, being greatly 

 inflated. MM. Daubenton and Desfontaines have seen poultry and sheep, 

 that had eaten of the leaves of the yew tree, die in a short time. These 

 pernicious effects of the yew have been confirmed by the repeated experience 

 of Professor Wiborg, in the Veterinary School, and at the Botanic Garden, 

 of Copenhagen. From the experiments of the professor, it appears that yew 



