Bishop Sutton was the last place I was to see upon the old road, for a mile beyond that village I left it where it turned northward, to go east into Ripley and so by the byways to climb into the hills, and crossing them to descend steeply at evening into the village of Selborne by the Oakhanger stream just before it enters that narrow brief pass into the Weald. There in the twilight I stayed for awhile under the yew tree in the churchyard to think of the writer, for love of whom I had made this journey all the way from Winchester. "In the churchyard of this village," writes Gilbert White in "The Antiquities of Selborne," "is a yew-tree whose aspect bespeaks it to be of great age; it seems to have seen several centuries and is probably co-eval with the church, and therefore may be deemed an antiquity; the body is squat, short and thick, and measures twenty-three feet in the girth, supporting a head of suitable extent to its bulk. This is a male tree, which in the spring sheds clouds of dust and fills the atmosphere around with its farina.... Antiquaries seem much at a loss to determine at what period this tree first obtained a place in churchyards. A statute was passed A.D. 1307 and 35 Edward I., the title of which is "Ne rector arbores in cemeterio prosternat." Now if it is recollected that we seldom see any other very large or ancient tree in a churchyard but yews, this statute must have principally related to this species of tree; and consequently their being planted in churchyards is of much more ancient date than the year 1307. As to the use of these trees, possibly the more respectable parishioners were buried under their shade before the improper custom was introduced of burying within the body of the church where the living are to assemble. Deborah, Rebekah's nurse, was buried under an oak--the most honourable place of interment --probably next to the cave of Machpelah, which seems to have been appropriated to the remains of the patriarchal family alone. The further use of yew trees might be as a screen to churches, by their thick foliage, from the violence of winds; perhaps also for the purpose of archery, the best long bows being made of that material, and we do not hear that they are planted in the churchyards of other parts of Europe, where long bows were not so much in use. They might also be placed as a shelter to the congregation assembling before the church doors were opened, and as an emblem of mortality by their funeral appearance. In the south of England every churchyard almost has its tree and some two; but in the north we understand few are to be found."