OF SELBOBNE. 
421 
fchj mortification to see nine young steers or bnllocks of hia 
own all lying dead in a heap from browzing a little on a 
hedge of yew in an old garden into which they had broken 
in snowy weather. Even the clippings of a yew hedge have 
destroyed a whole dairy of cows when thrown inadvertently 
into a yard. And yet sheep and turkey s^ and, as park- 
keepers say, deer, will crop these trees with impunity. 
Some intelligent persons assert that the branches of yew, 
while green, are not noxious ; and that they will kill only 
when dead and withered, by lacerating the stomach ; but to 
this assertion we cannot by any means assent, because, 
among the number of cattle that we have known fall victims 
to this deadly food, not one has been found, when it was 
opened, but had a lump of green yew in its paunch. True it 
is, that yew trees stand for twenty years or more in a field, 
and no bad consequences ensue ; but at some time or other 
cattle, either from wantonness when full, or from hunger 
when empty (from both which circumstances we have seen 
them perish) , will be meddling, to their certain destruction ; 
the yew seems to be a very improper tree for a pasture field. 
Antiquaries seem much at a loss to determine at what 
period this tree first obtained a place in churchyards. A 
statute passed a.d. 1307 and 35 Edward I. the title of 
which is Ne rector arbores in cemeterio prosternat.^^ Now 
if it is recollected that we seldom see any other very large 
or ancient tree in a churchyard, but yews, this statute must 
have principally related to this species of tree ; and 
consequently their being planted in churchyards is of much 
more ancient date than the year 1307. 
As to the use of these trees, possibty the more respect- 
able parishioners were buried under their shade before the 
improper custom was introduced of burying within the body 
of the church, where the living are to assemble. Deborah, 
Rebekah's nurse,^ was buried under an oak; the most 
honourable place of interment probably next to the cave of 
Machpelah,^ which seems to have been appropriated to the 
remains of the patriarchal family alone. 
Gen. XXXV. 8. 
2 Gen. xxiii. 9. 
