456 
MR. H. D. GELDART ON THE MISTLETOE. 
I can only say that Mr. Trimmer was a very cautious man and 
difficult to convince, except on good evidence. 
As to the suggestion that the plant cut from the Oak by the 
Druids was Loranthus and not Mistletoe, this might be all very 
well for Austria or Italy, supposing that there were any Druids 
in those countries, but can hardly apply to Great Britain, where 
the Loranthus does not grow. 
According to ‘Topographical Botany,’ second edition, our present 
best authority, Mistletoe occurs spontaneously in thirty-one counties 
of England, from Devonshire (which is queried as planted?), but 
.certainly from Somerset to York, and in one county of Wales, 
Denbigh ; to which must be added one or two more, as 
Mr. J. E. Griffiths, in his ‘Flora,’ published in 1895, records it 
for both the mainland of Carnarvonshire and the Island of Anglesea. 
It is not recorded with certainty from Cornwall, Huntingdon, 
Lincoln, Lancaster, Durham, Northumberland, Cumberland, or 
Westmoreland. 
In Scotland it is not native. There is an entry in Sir W. J. 
Hooker’s ‘ Flora Scotica ’ which has caused some question ; the 
original record in 1821 stands, “Woods of Mickleour (on Beech?).” 
We have seen that Mistletoe does not grow on Beech in England ; 
and this same entry dwindled down in the same author’s ‘ British 
Flora’ of 1850, to “ Meikleour introduced.” In East Anglia it 
cannot be called abundant. In our own county it has been recorded 
by Mr. Kirby Trimmer as growing on Apple, Hawthorn, Poplar, 
Ash, Oak, and Maple. I have seen it myself only on Apple, Ash, 
and Hawthorn. In Suffolk, Dr. Hind adds Lime and Crab; but 
in Cambridgeshire, Professor Babington has only two records, and 
mentions only the Apple as host. 
Its European distribution, according to the ‘Compendium of 
Cybele Britannica’ is Eiu’ope, all except Lapland and Finmark, 
and Northern Russia; it also grows in Siberia. 
