Such a tree was the "klinta tall" in Westmanland, under which a mermaid was said to dwell.

To this tree might occasionally be seen snow-white cattle driven up from the neighbouring lake across the meadows.

Another Swedish legend tells us how, when a man was on the point of cutting down a juniper tree in a wood, a voice was heard from the ground, saying, "friend, hew me not." But he gave another stroke, when to his horror blood gushed from the root[20].

Then there is the Danish tradition[21] relating to the lonely thorn, occasionally seen in a field, but which never grows larger.

Trees of this kind are always bewitched, and care should be taken not to approach them in the night time, "as there comes a fiery wheel forth from the bush, which, if a person cannot escape from, will destroy him." In modern Greece certain trees have their "stichios," a being which has been described as a spectre, a wandering soul, a vague phantom, sometimes invisible, at others assuming the most widely varied forms.