THE YEW 87 
from the graves by the setting sun. These gasses, or will-o’-ther 
wisps, divers have seen, and believed them dead bodies walk- 
ing abroad. Wheresoever it grows it is both dangerous and 
deadly to man and beast; the very lying under its branches 
has been found hurtful, yet the growing of it in churchyards 
is useful.” 
This belief in the fatal effect of even sleeping 
under the boughs of the Yew dates back from Galen 
and Dioscorides ; whilst Cesar records the death of 
Catibulus, king of the Eburones, from drinking its 
juice. Gerard, however, in his “ Herball” (1579), 
rashly denies all this, saying, “ All which I boldly 
affirm as untrue, because I have eaten my full of the 
berries, and slept in the branches, not once, but oft, 
without hurt.” 
The facts would seem to be that the seeds them- 
selves are poisonous, but the fleshy pink cup, or 
“aril,” as the botanists term it, of which children are 
so fond, is harmless. As to the boughs and leaves, it 
appears that cattle can be gradually accustomed to 
them when mixed with other food ; but that, either 
when green or when cut and half withered, they have 
been repeatedly fatal to horses, oxen, sheep, and 
deer. Gilbert White was probably right when he 
said that it was “either from wantonness when full 
or from hunger when empty” that the Yew is eaten 
by them with fatal consequences. Though the leaves 
are believed to act as a vermifuge, they are likely 
to be equally fatal to children, the poison acting 
either on the cerebro-spinal nerves or directly on the 
heart. 
The topiarian art in many an old farmhouse 
garden shows the Yew, patient under the shears, 
