YEW TREE. 



TAXUS BACCATA. 



TAX1J)E.. I)I(ECIA MONADEH'HIA. 



French, if ; Italian, tasso, libo. 



THE Yew tree is a native of Europe, North America, 

 and Japan, particularly in mountainous woods, or the 

 clefts of high calcareous rocks. It is indigenous of Eng- 

 land and Scotland, and is supposed formerly to have 

 grown wild in Ireland also, by the numbers found there 

 in a fossil state ; but at present there are none but planted 

 Yews growing in that country. 



It was a custom with our ancestors to plant Yews near 

 their houses and churches. Dr. Aikin supposes it to 

 have been planted near houses, merely for the absurd 

 purpose of forming it into grotesque figures ; the yew 

 being particularly submissive to such treatment. Dr. 

 Hunter says they were placed there, to be at hand for 

 the sturdy bows of our warlike ancestors ; 



" Who drew, 



And almost joined the horns of the tough yew/' 



Both may be right in some degree; they may have 

 furnished bows while bows were in fashion with our war- 

 riors, and afterwards have been converted into the figures 

 of which Dr. Aikin speaks. That both these fashions 

 reigned at once, it would be painful to conceive : how 

 grievous, on the eve of anew war, for all the green eagles 

 to be shorn of their wings, the green bulls of their horns, 





