THE YEW. 



Taxus baccata. 



Natural Order — Taxace^. 

 Class — DiCECiA. Order — Monadelphia. 



The Yew-tree, neither verdant, nor graceful, 

 but gloomy, terrible, and sapless," to judge from 

 Pliny's description, is a tree of evil omen. Not 

 only were the berries deemed poisonous, but 

 vessels made of the wood were said to impart the 

 same property to wine kept in them, and it was 

 considered more than hazardous to sleep or take 

 food under the shade of its branches. The very 

 name for the poison with which arrows were 

 armed, toxica^ was, according to the same author, 

 a corruption of taxica, from taxus, the Latin name 

 of the tree. Virgil agrees with Pliny in con- 

 demning the Yew ; he calls it a noxious tree, and 

 recommends that it should not be allowed to 

 stand near bee-hives. Other authors, ancient and 

 modern, join in assigning to it properties deadly 

 to various kinds of animals. No wonder then 

 that the frequent appearance of the Yew in 

 churchyards should have suggested the idea that 

 it was planted in such situations as an emblem 

 of death, and a fit shelter for the dead. That 

 the Yew was commonly planted by our fore- 

 fathers in churchyards, there can be no doubt, 

 for there are yet in existence a vast number of 

 these trees so planted many centuries since ; but 



