EUROPEAN YEW 



protected; which being transhitcd means that they 

 will not grow satisfactorily at all. 



In England the tree usually attains the height of 

 thirty to forty feet with low spreading branches. 



The English custom of planting Yews in church- 

 yards has never been satisfactorily exi)lained, nor is it 

 understood why the trees should be so closely con- 

 nected with superstitions relating to ghosts and fairies. 

 Possibly both may be of druidical origin. The fact 

 that the leaves are poisonous may account for some of 

 it ; certainly the belief that the tree was noxious was 

 very widespread. 



Shakespeare did not omit the Yew in his pictures of 

 English life, for the Clown in " Twelfth Night " lament- 

 ing the indifference of his lady-love sings, — 



My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, 

 O, prepare it ! 



and in '* Macbeth " among the contents of the witches' 

 caldron are, — 



* * * slips of yew 

 Slivered in the moon's eclipse. 



In " Richard II." Scroop says to the fallen king,— 



Thy very beadsmen learn to bend their bows 

 Of double-fatal yew against thy state. 



Two garden forms of Taxus haccata are extensively 

 planted under the names of Irish Yew, Taxus haccata 

 fastigiata, and Japanese Yew, Taxus haccata adprcssa. 

 Other forms appear, but these two are the most dis- 

 tinct and the most interesting. 



The Irish Yew is distinguished by its erect branches, 

 which produce a narrow, compact, cylindrical lorm, 



497 



