I. 8. THE YEW. 111 
Tse Yew. Grounp Hemziocx. VFarus Canadensis. Willdenow. 
The European variety figured in Loudon; Arboretum, VIII, Plate 293, and 
on pages 2074, 5, 7, 8,9; and by Strutt, in Sylva Britannica. 
In various parts of the western counties of Massachusetts, 
occurs a humble, almost prostrate evergreen, conspicuous for 
the rich and deep green of its foliage. It is the American yew. 
The road which leads from Pittsfield to Wilhamstown, after 
following up the valley of the Housatonic to its extremity, and 
crossing a low ridge of hills which supply some of its upper 
streams, descends the northern declivity and enters the valley 
of the Hoosic, with the magnificent Green Mountain range on 
the right, and the Hoosic Mountains on the left. Every trav- 
eller will remember a deep gorge, where he passes for some dis- 
tance under the shade of lofty trees, the rock maple, the white 
and yellow birch, and the hemlock, by the side of that wild and 
noisy stream, not yet visible. On emerging, and getting a sight 
of the river and its banks, he will perhaps remember,—if he is 
a lover of trees he cannot forget.—on the right bank. at the very 
foot of the mountain, along which the stream runs, and shaded 
from the morning’s sun by the trees which clothe its side, a mass 
or long bed, of the most vivid and delicious green. ‘The Amer- 
ican yew grows there in great luxuriance.. The traveller will 
be well rewarded for picking his way across the rocky river, to 
examine it. It delights in such scenes, and perhaps nowhere 
flourishes in greater beauty than on that spot. 
The stem of the American yew trails on the ground or just 
beneath the surface, to the distance of six or eight feet. Beneath 
the surface, it is covered with a smooth dark purple bark; where 
it protrudes above, it takes a grayish brown color. ‘The terminal 
stems are slightly ascending; irregularly branched with crooked 
branches. The recent green shoots are very small and slender, 
with two slightly projecting ridges below the base of each leaf. 
The leaves arrange themselves in two rows; they are close set, 
half an inch long, linear, flattened, rounded at the base, and 
very pointed at the extremity, with the mid-rib slightly pro- 
