Among the exotic species cultivated in our parks and gardens are the handsome variegated forms of the Evergreen Spindle (_Euonymus j.a.ponicus_) of China and j.a.pan, and the Broad-leaved Spindle (_E.

latifolius_) from Europe.

The Buckthorns (_Rhamnus_).

Our two native species of Buckthorn are shrubs of from five to ten feet in height. In this one respect they agree; in almost all others they differ. Both are Buckthorns in name, but the Breaking Buckthorn (_Rhamnus frangula_) is quite unarmed, whilst many of the branchlets of the Purging Buckthorn (_Rhamnus catharticus_) are hardened into spines.

The Purging Buckthorn is distinguished by its stiff habit, and by some of the leaves being gathered into bundles at the ends of the shoots. The leaves are egg-shaped, with toothed edges, and of a yellowish-green tint, with short leaf-stalks. The yellowish-green flowers are very small, and will be found both singly and in cl.u.s.ters from the leaf-axils. There are a four-cleft calyx, four petals, four stamens, or four stigmas, for the s.e.xes are usually on separate plants. The fruit is black, round, and about a quarter of an inch across, containing four stones. These so-called "berries" are ripe in September. Formerly they were much used as a purging medicine, but of so violent a character that their use has come to be discouraged, and the safer syrup of Buckthorn is prescribed instead. The juice of these berries is the raw material from which the artist's sap-green is prepared. It may be found in woods, thick hedgerows, and bushy places on commons southward of Westmoreland, showing a decided preference for chalky soils. In Ireland it only occurs rarely.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 88._ Breaking Buckthorn.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 89._ Fruits of Purging Buckthorn.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 90._ Fruits of Breaking Buckthorn.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Purging Buckthorn. A, flowers.]

The Breaking Buckthorn (_Rhamnus frangula_) is also known as the Berry-bearing Alder, its leaves, with their lateral veins, presenting something of the appearance of the Alder. Its more slender stems are purplish-brown in hue, and _all_ the leaves are arranged alternately up the stems. The leaves further differ from those of _R. catharticus_ in having plain, un-toothed edges, and their veins parallel one to another.

The flowers are similar in size to those of the other species, but are whiter, less yellow, fewer in number, and on longer stalks. The parts of the flower, too, are in fives instead of fours; and the "berry," though similar to the previous species, is much larger (half-inch diameter). In an unripe condition these fruits yield a good green dye, much used by calico printers and others. The wood made into charcoal is said to be the best for the purposes of the gunpowder makers, who know it by the name of Black Dogwood. The straight shoots of both species are used for forming walking and umbrella sticks, and those of longer growth for pea and bean sticks.

The Brimstone b.u.t.terfly (_Gonepteryx rhamni_) lays its eggs on the leaves of _R. frangula_, upon which the larva feeds. The name Buckthorn appears to be due to an ancient misunderstanding of the German name Buxdorn, which should have been translated Box-thorn.

Wild Plums (_Prunus communis_).

With the single exception of the Hazel, all our native fruit-trees are members of the extensive and beautiful Rose family. Before Roman invasions brought improved and cultivated varieties, our "rude forefathers" must have been glad to eat the Sloes, Crabs, and Wild Cherries that are now regarded as too terribly crude and austere, in an uncooked condition, for any stomach but that of the natural boy, which appears capable of surviving any ill-treatment. Some authors have regarded the Wild Plum and the Bullace as being specifically distinct from the Sloe and from each other; but the modern view is that their differences only ent.i.tle them to rank as sub-species of the Sloe, and as such they will be regarded here.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 91._ Flowers of Wild Plum.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 92._ Sloes.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 93._ Blackthorn--spring.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Blackthorn. A, flowers.]

The Sloe or Blackthorn (_Prunus communis_) is the rigid many-branched shrub, with stiletto-like tips, that luxuriates on some of our commons and in our hedgerows. The blackish bark that gives its name to the shrub forms a fine foil in March or April for the pure white starry blossoms that brave the cold blasts before the leaf-buds dare unfurl their coverings. In some places--as in Cornwall, where it is the princ.i.p.al hedge plant, and where cliffs, creeks, and river banks are bordered by it--these bare black or purple stems are almost hidden by the abundant growth of the Grey Lichen (_Evernia prunastri_). In this, the typical form, the branches and twigs turn in every direction, so that it is impossible to thrust one's hand into a Blackthorn bush without getting considerably scratched. The well-known flower consists of a five-lobed calyx, five white petals, and from fifteen to twenty stamens round the single carpel. The stigma matures in advance of the stamens, so that it has usually been fertilized by bee-borne pollen from another Sloe before its own anthers have disclosed their pollen. The fruit is about half an inch across, globose in form, and held erect upon its short stalk; black, but its blackness hidden by a delicate "bloom" that gives it a purplish glaucous hue. Terribly harsh are these fruits to the palate, and a mere bite at an unripe one is sufficient to set teeth on edge and contract the muscles of mouth and face. And yet, when the tight jacket of the Sloe begins to relax and pucker, the juice condenses into more mealy flesh, and the acridity pa.s.ses, one may _eat_ not one but a dozen, slowly, enjoying the piquancy of each before swallowing. Country people make them into wine, and it used to be said that much that is sold as port had its origin in the skins of British sloes instead of Portuguese grapes. And for special use "for the stomach's sake" old-wife followers of St. Paul pin their faith to gin in which Sloes have soaked for months.

In the days of our youth it was a stock jibe against the grocer that most of his China tea had been grown on Blackthorn bushes not far from home, and with tea at five or six shillings a pound there may have been some basis of truth for the belief; but with the prices of to-day it may be presumed that Blackthorn leaves would cost the dealer at least as much as real tea-leaves from a.s.sam and Darjeeling.

The Bullace (_Prunus communis_, sub-sp. _insit.i.tia_) differs from the Sloe in having _brown_ bark, the branches _straight_ and only a few of them ending in spines, the leaves larger, broader, more coa.r.s.ely toothed, and downy on the underside. The flowers, too, have broader petals, and the fruit--which may be black or yellow--droops, and is between three-quarters and one inch in diameter. In many places where this grows it can only be regarded as an escape from cultivation.

The Wild Plum (_Prunus communis_, sub-sp. _domestica_) has also brown bark, its branches straight, and not ending in spines. The downiness noticed on the underside of the Bullace leaves is here restricted to the ribs of the leaf. The fruit attains a diameter of an inch or an inch and a half. Although found occasionally in hedgerows, this sub-species is not indigenous in any part of our islands. Hooker says the only country in which it is really indigenous is Western Asia; but its numerous cultivated forms are widely distributed.

It should be noted that the fruits of the Blackthorn and its sub-species are formed within the flower; so are those of the Cherries, to be next described, the ovary being botanically termed "superior," that is, above the base of the calyx and corolla, when the flower is in an erect position. This is a point of some importance when one seeks to understand the different formation of the fruit in so closely related a species as the Apple, in which the ovary is "inferior," or below the flower.

Wild Cherries (_Prunus avium_).

Nature has been comparatively lavish in the matter of Cherries, for she has bestowed three species upon the British Islands. For the cultivated Cherry it is said that we ought to thank the Romans, as for many other good things in the way of food. Pliny states that we had the Cherry in Britain by the middle of the first century A.D. Evelyn tells us that the Cherry orchards of Kent owe their origin to "the plain industry of one Richard Haines, a printer to Henry VIII.," by whom "the fields and environs of about thirty towns, in Kent only, were planted with fruit trees from Flanders, to the unusual benefit and general improvement of the county to this day." It is probable, however, that our own countrymen had already effected some improvement on the wild sorts by cultivation, for even in the woods some trees are found bearing fruit much larger and of better flavour than usual, and such would be selected for cultivation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 94._ Gean in flower.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 95._ Flowers of Gean.]

Our three natives are the Wild or Dwarf Cherry (_Prunus cerasus_), the Gean (_P. avium_), and the Bird Cherry (_P. padus_). Of these the Gean is the species most widely distributed throughout our country, and we therefore give it precedence.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Gean. A, fruit; B, flower.]

The Gean (_Prunus avium_) is a tree that in suitable soils attains a height of thirty or forty feet, with short, stout branches, that take an upward direction. The leaves are large, broadly oval, with sharp-toothed edges, and downy on the underside. They always droop from the branches, and in spring they are of a bronzy-brown tint, which afterwards changes to pale green. Soon after the leaves have unfolded they are almost hidden by the umbels of wide-open white flowers, which have soft, heart-shaped petals, and whose anthers and stigmas mature simultaneously. The firm-fleshed drupe is heart-shaped, black or red, sweet or bitter, with scanty juice which stains the fingers. This is believed to be the original wild stock from which our modern Black Hearts and Bigarreau Cherries have been evolved by the cultivator.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Wild Cherry. A, fruit; B, flower.]

The Dwarf or Wild Cherry (_Prunus cerasus_) is more bush-like than tree-like, for it sends up a great number of suckers around the main stem. The branches are slender and drooping. The leaves, which are of similar shape to those of _P. avium_, are smooth and deep blue-green in tint, with round-toothed edges. The flowers are not so widely open as in the previous species, but retain more of the cup-shape, whilst the notched petals are firmer in consistence and oval in shape. The drupe is in this species round, with red skin and juicy flesh of a distinctly acid character. The juice does not stain as does that of _P. avium_. The Morello or Brandy Cherry, the May Duke, and the Kentish Cherries are considered to be derived from this species. This does not extend further north than Yorkshire; in Ireland it is rare.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 96._ Bird Cherry--spring.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 97._ Bole of Bird Cherry.]

The Bird Cherry (_Prunus padus_) forms a tree from ten to twenty feet in height, with more elliptic leaves, which have their edges doubly cut into fine teeth. The flowers are not cl.u.s.tered in umbels, as in both the foregoing, but in a loose raceme from lateral spurs of new growth. The flowers are erect when they open, and the stigmas mature before the anthers, so that cross-fertilization is favoured in this species. After fertilization the flower droops, to be out of the way of the bees in their visits to the unfertilized blossoms. The petals in this species look as if their edges had been gnawed. The drupes are small, black, and very bitter, with a wrinkled stone. This is a northern species, coming not further south than Leicestershire and South Wales. All three species flower in late April or early May.

Cherry wood is strong, fine-grained, and of a red colour. It is easily worked, and susceptible of a high polish, so that it is in request by cabinet-makers, turners, and musical instrument makers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 98._ Flowers of Wild Apple.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 99._ Bird Cherry--winter.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 100._ Wild Pear--spring.]

The Wild Pear (_Pyrus communis_).

The Wild Pear is only to be found growing in the southern half of Britain, its northward range not extending beyond Yorkshire, and even in the south its claim to be regarded as a true native has been contested.

Mr. Hewett C. Watson regards it as more probably a denizen, that is, a species originally introduced by man, which has maintained its hold upon the new land. Upon this a.s.sumption it is probable that the introduced specimens were already somewhat cultivated, but when they (or their descendants) became wild they reverted to the original condition of the species.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Wild Pear. A, flower.]

The Wild Pear, or Choke-pear, is a small tree, from twenty to sixty feet in height, of somewhat pyramidal form. The twigs, which are usually of a drooping tendency, are also much given to ending in spines--a character scarcely apparent in the cultivated tree. The leaves, too, of the wild tree are more distinctly toothed than those of the Garden Pear. They are oval in shape, with blunt-toothed edges, and downy on the lower surface.

Along the new shoots the leaves are arranged alternately on opposite sides, but on shoots a year old they are produced in cl.u.s.ters. The flowers, which measure more than an inch across, are pure white in colour, and are cl.u.s.tered in cymes of five to nine. They appear in April and May, and are of the Wild Rose type, there being numerous stamens, from three to five styles, which ripen before the stamens, five petals, and the calyx, taking the form of a pitcher with a five-lobed mouth, represents the five sepals.

In speaking of the Wild Plums we directed attention to the fact that the ovary was within the flower; in the Pear (and the other members of the genus _Pyrus_) it is below the flower, hidden away in fact within the calyx-tube. When the flower opens it is ready for fertilization, but as the stamens of that flower are not yet mature this can only be accomplished by pollen brought by the bees from other flowers as they rifle the honey-glands. The effect of pollination is to cause special vegetative activity in the neighbourhood of the ovary, resulting in the thickening of the flesh of the calyx-tube around it, until it has become of the characteristic pear-shape, and an inch or two in length. A section of a pear or apple, taken lengthwise, will show a faint green outline of the ovary, and will demonstrate how much of the flesh is really belonging to the calyx-tube. The fruit of the Wild Pear is green until about November, when it turns yellow. It is of too harsh a character to be fit for eating.

A Pear formerly known as a variety (_briggsii_) of _Pyrus communis_ is now regarded as a distinct species under the name of _Pyrus cordata_. It is found in Cornwall, and is distinguished by its more oval leaves being rounded at the base, and by its much smaller fruits being often globular.

The Pear is a long-lived tree, that grows singly or in small groups on dry plains. It attains a height of about fifty feet in thirty years, and its girth may then be three or four feet. The timber is fine-grained, strong and heavy, with a reddish tinge. Stained with black, it is used to counterfeit ebony.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pl. 101._ Wild Apples.]