He it was Whose impious axe mid Ceres’ sacred grove Dared violate her immemorial shades. Huge with the growth of ages in its midst An ancient oak there stood, itself a grove, With votive tablets hung and grateful gifts For vows accomplished. Underneath its shade The dryads wove their festal dance. Eresicthon, in spite of warnings, refused to stay his hand. The trembling tree sent forth an audible groan! From its pale leaves and acorns died the green, Dark oozing sweat from every branch distilled, And as the scoffer smote it, crimson-red Gushed from the wounded bark the sap, as streams When at the altar falls some mighty bull The life-blood from his neck. Then from its heart Issued a voice, “Thou strikest in this trunk A nymph whom Ceres loves, and for the deed Dearly shalt pay. With my last voice thy doom I prophesy, and in thy imminent fate Find solace for my own.”[135] Mannhardt quotes several mediaeval and modern instances of the belief in bleeding trees.[136] And stories of punishment incurred for destroying a spirit-inhabited tree are not uncommon in folk-lore. There is a German legend of an old crone who attempted to uproot the trunk of an ancient fir-tree. In the midst of her labours a sudden weakness fell upon her, insomuch that she was scarcely able to walk. While endeavouring to crawl home she met a mysterious stranger, who, hearing her story, at once pronounced that in her attempts to uproot the tree she had wounded an elf inhabiting it. If the elf recovered, he said, so would she; if not, she would die. As the old woman perished that self-same night we are left to infer that the elf died also. From India comes a similar recital. While felling a tree the youthful Satyavant broke out into a profuse sweat, and overcome with sudden weakness, fainted and died upon the spot: he had mortally wounded the indwelling spirit. Such stories have no doubt arisen from the dread inspired by wood-spirits amongst all people who believe in them. In short, the wild inhabitants of the woods have always retained some of the awe with which their forerunners, the demons, were regarded. Often they are credited with quite a wanton vindictiveness. A Bengal folk-tale tells of a certain banian-tree haunted by spirits who had a habit of wringing the necks of all who ventured to approach the tree by night.[137] In another Indian story a tree that grew beside a Brahman’s house was inhabited by a _sankchinni_, a female spirit of white complexion, who one day seized the Brahman’s wife and thrust her into a hole in the tree.[138] Sometimes the tree-spirit will be wicked and foolish enough to enter into a human being, and then the exorcist’s services are called in. The presence of the spirit is easily discovered. The exorcist has only to set fire to a piece of turmeric root, it being of common knowledge that no spirit can endure the smell of burning turmeric.