606 ICOSANDRIA. FENTAGYNIA. Pyrus, 
Seeds three, four, five, reddish. Relh. Flowers whitish, (numerous, of 
an agreeable scent. Berries in beautiful bunches, highly ornamental 
through the latter part of the summer and autumn. Leaves when young 
slightly pubescent beneath. E.) 
Mountain Ash. Quicken-tree. Roan-tree, in Scotland. Irish : 
j Keora Cahran. Welsh : Pren criafal. Gaeli c: Craobh chaorain. P.aucn - 
paria. Gaert. Sm. Hook. Grev. Sorbus aucuparia. Linn. Huds. With, to 
Ed. 7. Willd. E.) Woods and hedges in mountainous and boggy situa¬ 
tions in Wales, Scotland, and the north of England. 
(“ How clung the Rowan to the rock, 
And through the foliage shewed his head, 
With narrow leaves and berries red.” Marmion. E.) 
T. April* 
* This tree grows either in woods or open fields, but best on the sides of hills and in fertile 
soil. It will not bear lopping. Plants grow well in its shade. The wood is soft, tough, and 
solid, (excellent for hoops, and for bows next to Yew ; also considered lasting for posts. E.) 
It is converted into tables, spokes for wheels, shafts, chairs, &c. (The tall straight rods 
are well adapted and used for making hurdles. Bree, in Purt. The roots are formed 
into handles for knives and wooden spoons. The berries dried and reduced to powder, 
make wholesome bread; and an ardent spirit may be distilled from them, which has a fine 
flavour, but it is small in quantity. The berries too, infused in water, make an acid liquor, 
(called Diod Griafol , E.), somewhet like perry, which is drank by the poorer people in 
Wales. (In Jura the juice is used as an acid for punch. E.) In Germany the fowlers use the 
berries to entice Redwings and Fieldfares into nooses of hair suspended in the woods; 
whence its trivial name ; (to which attraction alludes the Mantuan’s lay: 
“ Sanguineisque inculta rubent aviaria baccis.” 
Twelve pounds of berries yield two quarts of spirit; the pulp, after distillation, affords 
excellent nourishment for cattle. The bark when collected in autumn, (according to ex¬ 
periments made in Germany), is better adapted to the tanning of leather than even that of 
Oak. This tree appears to have been highly esteemed by the Druids, and is still found more 
frequently than any other in the neighbourhood of Druidical circles in the Scotch Highlands. 
Even in these more enlightened times, natives of the North may be found, who profess to 
believe in the efficacy of a small branch carried about them as a charm against witchcraft 
and enchantment. In one part of Scotland, at Strathspey, the sheep and lambs are on 
May Day made to pass through a hoop of Roan wood ; (and the Scotch dairy-maid will 
drive her cattle to the shealings, or summer pastures, with no other rod than that of the 
Roan-tree. Evelyn assures us that “ ale and beer brewed with these berries, being ripe, is 
an incomparable drink, familiar in Wales, where this tree is reputed so sacred, that there 
is not a church-yard without one of them planted in it, (as among us the Yew), so, on a 
certain day in the year, every body religiously wears a cross made of the wood : and the tree 
is by some authors called Fraxinus Cambro-Britannica, reputed to be a preservative 
against fascinations and evil spirits; whence perhaps we call it Wilchen , the boughs being 
stuck about the house, or the wood used for walking-staves.” These vestige^ of ancient 
superstitions, here either altogether exploded, or reduced to unmeaning customs, remind us 
of the amulets we have observed still so frequently suspended round the necks of cattle, or 
worn, with implicit faith, by the ignorant peasantry, in the South of Europe. Allusion 
is made to such property, as Dr. Hunter remarks, in a very ancient song, called the Laidley 
Worm of Spindleston Heughs : 
“Their spells were vain: The hags returned 
To the queen in sorrowful mood, 
Crying, that witches have no power , 
Where there is Rown-tree wood.” 
And this leads, as some commentators imagine, to the true reading of a passage in Shaks- 
peare’s Macbeth, substituting (Act 1. s. 3.) “ A rown-tree , witch 1 ” for the usual reading 
“ Aroint thee , witch 1 ”—but this we deny ; the latter being a genuine adverb of expul¬ 
sion or avoidance, used by the bard with a like meaning in other passages, (as Edgar in 
Lear, 8c c.) though since become obsolete. “In September and October few trees add 
