PACIFIC YEW. / 



ous replacement; tolerant of the most rigorous discipline, 

 and patient of the greatest abuse; bright with those precious 

 gemmed fruits in long succession, and that longevity 

 ''wherein the memory of man runneth not to the contrary." 

 We say these, with unnumbered considerations, will forever 

 commend the Pacific Yew to our high estimation. 



Although Homer and Virgil speak of "bows of the tough 

 yew," they were not mentioned in English history until the 

 time of the Saxons, when the wood became so popular as 

 to be quite exhausted in many countries. Modern recrea- 

 tions of elite archery are largely and profitably reviving the 

 old demand; the timber is now already being transported 

 East, and exported abroad. The matured heart-timber is 

 deep red, or beafsteak-colored, hard, heavy, and apt to be 

 brittle if at all short or cross-grained; makes excellent pul- 

 lies, friction-rollers, boxes, gudgeons, and for turning pur- 

 poses in general is exceedingly valuable. Our species, at 

 least, seems to stand well, for if half burieol will slowly 

 weather-wear away, but still keeps its size and soundness 

 below for ages. No doubt there are preferred sections in this 

 as in all other timbers. The boughs, within moderate lim- 

 its of tension, have the quick snap and short twang for the 

 bow, like its renowned congeners, and have ever been used 

 by the natives here as of yore, and by young America even 

 unto our day. But some of our native tribes seem to prefer 

 the willow-root bow for the belly, sinew-lined on the back; 

 ash for arrows, or the shoots of tessaria boreal is. The Latin 

 name Ta.vus, is supposed to be derived from the Greek Toxon, 

 a bow. It should be added that the bark is clean and thin 

 like madrono, sycamore, manzanita, and all such like trees, 

 as together with Yew, flake off the old, and renew their 

 exterior bark every year. The flowers — male and female — 

 are found on the same tree ; staminate, or males, in little 

 heads seen solitary springing from axillary scaly buds, the 

 yellow anthers standing out, shield or parasol-shaped, with 

 six to eight folds or cells opening beneath ; the female, green, 

 broad-scaly, at first like a tiny acorn, fairy cup and all, the 

 upper united scale or rather bractoid base, at length thicken- 

 ing into a nest-like rub} r red coroloid fleshy cup, the rim of 

 which often becomes higher than the little nut-like seed 

 that sits so pertly in it. 



The Pacific Yew is never naturally degraded, groveling 

 low upon the ground, like the disconsolate Eastern one; 

 and if we must needs personify it, like the true child of 

 nature, or the barbarous Indian, then let it be to him the 

 11 fighting wood," because he maketh of it the death-dealing 

 bow. But to our more genial eye, it rejoices in a song of 

 freedom and recreation, above, among the trees of the forest, 

 apter emblem of more elevated and cheerful views of life, or 



