Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions

The Shamrock^ and other Sacred Plants. 237
when Wolseley's ultimatum reached the King of Ashantee.
The ruthless cutting of trees was deemed cruel. Even if
they had no living spirit of their own, the souls of the dead
might be there confined ;
but perhaps Mr. Gladstone, the
tree-feller, is no believer in that spiritual doctrine.
In Germany one may still witness the marrying of trees
on Christmas Eve with straw-ropes, that they may yield
well. Their forefathers' regard for the World-tree, the ash
Yggdrasill, may incline Germans to spare trees, and raise
them, as Bismarck loves to do. Women there, and elsewhere,
found consolation from moving round a sacred tree
on the approach of nature's trial. The oldest altars stood
under trees, as by sacred fountains or wells. But some had
to be shunned as demoniac trees.
The Irish respected the Cairthaim, quicken -tree, quickbeam,
rowan, or mountain ash, which had magical qualities.
In the story of the Fairy Palace of tJie Quicken-tree, we
read of Einn the Einian leader being held in that tree by
enchantment, as was Merlin by the fairy lady. MacCuill,
son of the hazel, one of the last Tuath kings, was so-called
because he worshipped the hazel. Eairies danced beneath
the hawthorn. Ogham tablets were of yew. Lady Wilde
styled the elder a sacred tree ;
and the blackthorn, to
which the Irishman is said to be still devoted, was a sacred
tree.
Trees of Knowledge have been recognized east and west.
That of India was the Kalpa. The Celtic Tree of Life
was not unlike that of Carthage. The Persians, Assyrians,
and American Indians had their Trees of Life. One
Egyptian holy tree had seven branches on each side.
Erom the Sycamore, the goddess Nou provided the liquor
of life ;
from the Persea, the goddess Hathor gave fruits
of immortality. The Date-palm was sacred to Osiris six
thousand years ago. The Tree of Life was sometimes