MOORLAND IDYLLS. 



Even these, too, have been Christianized, 

 in accordance with Gregory's well-known 

 advice to Augustine. The holy sites of 

 the ancient faiths, said the wise Pope, in 

 his epistle, were still to be respected ; but 

 the demons who inhabited them were 

 to be exorcised by the use of Christian 

 symbols, and the temples were to be 

 sanctified to Christian worship. In accord- 

 ance with this policy, a figure of the 

 cross was marked upon the bark of the 

 old sacred tree in Wai ford Ploy- Field, 

 which thus became known as the Crouch 

 or Cross Oak ; for the Latin crux came 

 first into our language under the truer 

 English form of crouch, and only assumed 

 its later pronunciation of cross under 

 northern influences. Similar Christiani- 

 zation of holy oaks, shire oaks, boundary 

 oaks, Druid oaks, and other heathen 

 temples or heathen termini, went on all 

 over England ; so that what were once 

 Thunor's trees and Woden's trees, or still 

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