Note 163:1 — MISTLETOE.
Reading edition
"Mistel est a mist stercus, quod ex stercore avium pronascitur, nec aliter pronasci potest."—Wachter, Glossary (quoted in "Notes and Queries," 3rd series, vii. 157. In the same volume are several papers on the origin of the word). Dr. Prior derives it from mistl (different), and tan (twig), being so unlike the tree it grows upon.