EVERGREEN ORNAMENTAL TREES. 
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verdure and freshness, inevitably lead the mind from the 
ideas of death which an ordinary barren churchyard alone 
inspires, to reflections of a purer and loftier cast ; the im- 
mortality which awaits the soul when disenthralled of clay. 
Among the old English poets, we find much of these feel- 
ings in favour of decorating the precincts of the grave, and 
surrounding them with what may be called the 'poetry of 
grief. Herrick, one of the sweetest of the number, in some 
lines addressed to the Cypress and Yew, says : 
“ Bothe of ye have 
Relation to the grave ; 
And where 
The funeral trump sounds, you are there. 
I shall be made 
Ere longe a fleeting shade ; 
Pray come, 
And do some honour to my tomb.” 
Some of the old Yews in the churchyards and gardens of 
England have attained a wonderful period of longevity. 
Gilpin mentions one in the churchyard of Tisbury in Dor- 
setshire, now standing and in fine foliage, though the trunk 
is quite hollow, which measures thirty-seven feet in circum- 
ference, and the limbs are proportionately large. The tree 
is entered by a rustic gate ; and seventeen persons lately 
breakfasted in its interior. It is said to have been planted 
many generations ago by the Arundel family. The famous 
Yew at Arkenwyke House, which Henry VIII. made his 
place of meeting with Anna Boleyn when she was there, is 
supposed to be upwards of a thousand years old ; it is forty- 
nine feet high, twenty-seven in circumference, and the 
branches extend over an area of two hundred and seven feet. 
There are besides these, a great number of other celebrated 
