Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1897-03-19
GOLDEN MISTLETOE.
THE WONDERFUL TREE IN A BEAU
 TlFUL GROVE.
Legends of the Gloomy Vale and Death of Balder the Beautiful-Ancients Be- lieyed That Trees Could Feel Pain Ro- man and Greek Mythology.

of Balder the Beautiful-Aneients Be- lieved That Trees Could Feel Pain-Ro- man and Greek Mythology.
 Und grun des Lebens eoldner Baum.
 Faust.
 The sacred books of the Buddhists prove that in tho early days of their religion question which deeply agi- tated the minds of the learned was whether or not the trees had souls, says writer in the Philadelphia Ledger. The controversy ragged strongly, for the belief was widespread that ill injnring or mutiiating tree proportionate pain was inflicted on it's spirits naturo
 The same idea creeps ont again and again in Greek and Roman mythology, and tho folklore of every country and people in Europe is full of 1t. and at such seasons as Christmas these primi- tive customs are actually practieed
 Tho numerous German and English songs and offerings to the apple trees arc still heard and seen on every Christi mas. Ovid in his Metamorphoses' tells the beautiful story of Erisiethon's i'm. pious attack on the grove of Ceres and how the Greek dryads and hamadryads had their lives linked to tree, and as this withers and dies they themselves fall away and cease Go be. Any injury to bough or twig Is felt as wound, and wholesale hewing down puts an end to them at once A cry of anguish es- capes them when the cruel ax comes near.
 It was this established belief that produced such lines as:
 Loud through the air resounds the woodmans
 stroke,
 When. loi voice breahs from the grooming
 oak,
 Spare, spare my life. trembling virgin sparel Oh, listen to the hamadryad' s prayer
 No longer let that fearful resQupd, Preserve the tree to which my life Is bound. See, from the bark my blood in torrents flows. I faint. sink, perish from your blows.
 Accepting, then, this prevalent faith i'll tho actual life and soul of the trees, we must pass on to the subjects on hand -the golden bough or mistletoe-the classic gloomy vale and it's locality, wherein the legend of Baider the Beau tiful and his death by tho mistletoe shaft are in touch with the ancient doc. trines of treo worship.
 It is often stated that Virgil gave this name of the golden bough to tho mistle- toe, whereas he only compares it with the mistletoe
 In the sixth book of the "Hneid'' he tells us how two doves. guiding Hneaa to the gloomy vale, in whose depth grew the golden bough, alighted upon tree ''whenee shone 6 fliokering gleam of Ao In ae,i sxtfx T the mistletoe-~a plant not native to its tree--is green with fresh leaves and twines it's yellow berries about the boles. Such seemed upon the shady oak the leafy gold. so rustied in the gentle breeze the golden leaf" Virgil does not say it is the mistletoe, and yet what elsea It's Identification is perfect,
 The poet locates the gloomy vale iE the neighborhood of Lake Avernus, but Italian tradition. as recorded by Seryi- us points to the grove of Nemi, Aricia. Now the story of this Arician grove ia embodied in Maoaulay's lines:
 The Rdaas;tb Rstil; gagsy g,yas ae tlas that sleeps
 Those trees in whose dim shadow
 The ghastly priest doth reign.
 Tho priest who slew the slayer
 And shall himself be slain.
 In days of antiquity in this beautiful grove grew Q wonderful tree, round which prowling figure. sword in hand, seemed to be constantly expeetant of an attack from some enemy. Yet he was the priest of the grove. and, by the or. der of his office, he would some day be killed by the claimant who wished to succeed him. To gain his position he had slain his predecessor, and, in course of time. must himself be slain Such is brief context of Strabo's version The branches of tho tree might not be bro- ken, except by runaway slave. This bough gave him the right tp challenge the priest, and. if successful, to assume the title of ''king of the wood Ira dition tells that this was the bough which Eneas plucked before he jour- neyed to the lower world.
 In the familiar story from Morse mythology of Balder the Beautiful we recall the facts that he first dreamed and had great foreboding of evil. yet he belonged neither to earth nor heaven. His fellow gods, anxious to protect him, took an oath from fire, air, earth and water. stones, trees and plants, sick nesses and poison, birds. creeping things and four footed beasts that they should not injure Balder.
 Being thus inyuinerabie, the gods amused themselves by throwing stones and logs at him. Then Loki. the mis- chief maker, discovered that east of Walhalla grew tho mistletoe "that seemed too young and innocent to swear. Pulling it. he placed branch in blind Hodur's hands, who threw and struck Balder dead Then his body was placed on his great ship Ringhor, the funeral pyre was lit, his faithful wife, Nanna-whose tears had fallen on the fatal branch and been turned into poarly berries--and his warhorse were burned with him as the ship drifted away toward the northern sky edge
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