It was, too, in reference to this custom that Shakespeare, in "Hamlet" (iv. 7), represented poor Ophelia hanging her flowers on the "willow aslant a brook." "This tree," says Douce,[561] "might have been chosen as the symbol of sadness from the cxxxvii. Psalm (verse 2): 'We hanged our harps upon the willows;' or else from a coincidence between the _weeping_-willow and falling tears." Another reason has been assigned. The _Agnus castus_ was supposed to promote chastity, and "the willow being of a much like nature," says Swan, in his "Speculum Mundi" (1635), "it is yet a custom that he which is deprived of his love must wear a willow garland." Bona, the sister of the King of France, on receiving news of Edward the Fourth's marriage with Elizabeth Grey, exclaimed,
"in hope he'll prove a widower shortly, I'll wear the willow garland for his sake."
[561] "Illustrations of Shakespeare," p. 105.
_Wormwood._ The use of this plant in weaning infants is alluded to in "Romeo and Juliet" (i. 3), by Juliet's nurse, in the following passage:
When it did taste the wormwood on the nipple Of my dug, and felt it bitter, pretty fool."
_Yew._ This tree, styled by Shakespeare "the dismal yew" ("Titus Andronicus," ii. 3), apart from the many superstitions associated with it, has been very frequently planted in churchyards, besides being used at funerals. Paris, in "Romeo and Juliet" (v. 3), says:
"Under yond yew-trees lay thee all along, Holding thine ear close to the hollow ground; So shall no foot upon the churchyard tread, Being loose, unfirm, with digging up of graves, But thou shalt hear it."
Although various reasons have been assigned for planting the yew-tree in churchyards, it seems probable that the practice had a superstitious origin. As witches were supposed to exercise a powerful influence over the winds, they were believed occasionally to exert their formidable power against religious edifices. Thus Macbeth says (iv. 1):
"Though you untie the winds, and let them fight Against the churches."
To counteract, therefore, this imaginary danger, our ancestors may have planted the yew-tree in their churchyards, not only on account of its vitality as an evergreen, but as connected in some way, in heathen times, with the influence of evil powers.[562] In a statute made in the latter part of Edward I.'s reign, to prevent rectors from cutting down trees in churchyards, we find the following: "Verum arbores ipsæ, propter ventorum impetus ne ecclesiis noceant, sæpe plantantur."[563]