420 
ANTIQUITIES 
LETTER Y. 
JSS^^^S^^ ^ fhe churclijard of this village is a yew-tree, 
whose aspect bespeaks it to be of a great age ; 
it seems to have seen several centuries, and 
p^Sj is probably coeval with the church, and there- 
^^^^^^^ fore may be deemed an antiquity : the body is 
squat, short, and thick, and measures [upwards of] twenty- 
three feet in the girth, supporting a head of suitable extent 
to its bulk. This is a male tree, which in the spring sheds 
clouds of dust, and fills the atmosphere tround with its farina. 
As far as we have been able to observe, the males of this 
species become much larger than the females ; and it has so 
fallen out that most of the yew-trees in the churchyards 
of this neighbourhood are males ; but this must have been 
matter of mere accident, since men, when they first planted 
yews, little dreamed that there were sexes in trees. 
In a yard, in the midst of the street, till very lately, grew 
a middle sized female tree of the same species, which com- 
monly bore great crops of berries. By the high winds 
usually prevailing about the autumnal equinox, these berries, 
then ripe, were blown down into the road, where the hogs 
ate them. And it was very remarkable, that, though 
barrow-hogs and young sows found no inconvenience from 
this food, yet milch-sows often died after such a repast: a 
circumstance that can be accounted for only by supposing 
that the latter, being much exhausted and hungry^ devoured 
a larger quantity. 
While mention is making of the bad efiects of yew- 
berries, it may be proper to remind the unwary, that the 
twigs and leaves of yew, though eaten in a very small 
quantity, are certain death to horses and cows, and that in 
a few minutes. A horse tied to a yew hedge, or to a faggot 
stack of dead yew, shall be found dead before the owner 
can be aware that any danger is at hand, and the writer 
has been several times a sorrowful witness to losses of this 
kind among his friends ; and in the island of Ely had once 
