158 JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
" There isn't," said my companion — a gentleman residing in the 
district — "a person, old or young, living in this neighbourhood, 
who would dare to injure that tree, or to take from it a twig, or a 
flower, or a berry, or even a leaf." 
" Is it held to be sacred then 1 ?" 
"Well, yes, in a certain sense. The facts are these: — Daring 
our last war with France, a French privateer, hovering on the 
coast, sent at nightfall a boat's crew ashore, who took from the 
miller who then lived here everything they could find, even the 
bed under his wife, who had recently been confined. Having by 
him a considerable sum of money in a purse or small bag, he, 
without being observed, flung it out at the window, hoping that it 
might thus escape the privateers, and that he might recover it in 
the morning. At day-break there was no trace of the privateer; 
and on proceeding to that part of his premises where, if anywhere, 
his money would be found, he had the good fortune to see his 
purse with all its contents hanging in the elder tree. From that 
time it has been free from every kind of molestation on the part 
of those who know the story ; . and parents still point it out to 
their children as ' the tree which saved the miller's money.'" (Trans. 
Devon. Assoc., ix., 99-100.) 
2. Symbolization : — On my way back, on May 23rd, 1877, from 
the visit to Kingswear mentioned at the beginning of this paper, 
I felt strongly impressed with the idea that the " passing through " 
was symbolical of something ; and, after much cogitation on the 
facts of the case I had been studying, arrived at the conclusion 
that the " something " was birth, and birth free from human im- 
purity of any kind. The defective child had been born again, and 
the result was greater perfection. 
To this conclusion I have ever since adhered, and farther thought 
and reading have but strengthened my conviction. Indeed, I soon 
found that I had been anticipated. "All these various passings 
through," said Mr. Bruce, in the Athenaeum article already quoted, 
" seem symbolical, as Dalyell has remarked [Darker Superstitions 
of Scotland, p. 123] of regeneration, 'a second birth, whereby a 
living being is ushered into the world free from those infirmities 
and imperfections incorporated with a former life.'" 
3. Is Regeneration a doctrine peculiar to Christianity ? — The 
