So I forget a curse yet unrepeal'd,
All lovely as she looks, on Nature lies,—

That all above, around me, and beneath,

Earth, sea, and sky, despite their present calm,
Obnoxious are to change, and blight, and storm,
As man to sin and death.

Remembrance sad!

And yet, though sad, sweet thoughts 'twill prompt at

times;

For if a fallen world be still so fair,

A world which sin has marr'd, where sin doth dwell,-
Oh! what will be that paradise of God

Prepar❜d for those who love Him! Eye nor ear
Hath seen or heard the glory. There no blight,
No change of season comes, for sin is not.
But God Himself will be the light thereof,
"And one unbounded spring encircle all."

THE YEW.

TAXUS BACCATA.

"The grave, dread thing,

Men shiver when thou'rt named.

Well do I know thee by thy trusty yew,
Cheerless, unsocial plant."

THE infinite diversity observable in the works and appearances of nature, has already been remarked. In proof of which the sylvan realm offers, perhaps, few stronger contrasts, certainly not in our country, than the light elegant tree we have just been considering, the true similitude of youth and gaiety, and the gloomy, funereal yew, the very sight of which makes us think

"Of graves, of worms, and epitaphs,

And choose executors, and talk of wills."

And yet despite its sombre and mournful character, and the opprobrious epithets which poetry has heaped on it, it is a picturesque tree, and one of no inconsiderable

renown.

The

"In is in high favour with Gilpin. yew a state of nature," says he," it is, perhaps, one of the most beautiful evergreens we have. Indeed, I know not whether, all things considered, it is not superior to the cedar of Lebanon itself. I mean to such meagre representations of that noble tree as we have in England. The same soil which cramps the cedar is congenial with the yew."

"This tree is a pure native of Britain." When left to its own choice of situation, it grows most freely in mountainous woods, or more particularly in the fissures of limestone rocks; in such places it is still abundant, though far less so than formerly, when "it was to our ancestors what the oak now is to their descendants, the basis of their strength." In those days when we trusted to the bow for our defence, it was ordained by statute that every man should have an English bow, of his own height, made of yew, wych, hazel, ash, or auburn (supposed to be alder). But, "as for brasell, elme, wych, and ashe," says Roger Ascham, "experience doth prove them to be mean for bowes; and so to conclude, ewe of all other things is that whereof perfite shootinge would have a bowe made." Shakspeare countenances this opinion by the epithet he bestows on it in Richard the Second: