8 THE FRUITS OF THE COUNTRY-SIDE 



It was in the olden time employed to garland the maypole, 

 and to take a generally honoured and conspicuous place in 

 the festivities of May-day. The bursting of the leaf-buds, 

 transfiguring the plant in a few short days from its Winter 

 condition of leafless stem to a mass of verdure, and thence 

 onward to its vesture of snow-white blossoms, is one of 

 the most characteristic indications that the long-looked-for 

 Spring has at last really come. Thus Spenser, in drawing 

 up his Shepherd'' s Calendar^ writes : 



Seest thou not thilke same havvthorne studde 

 How braggly it begins to budde 

 And utter his tender head ? 



While Thomson, in his Springs dwells upon the whitening- 

 hawthorn. In like manner Shakespeare indicates that 

 delightful time 



When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear, 



and, with no less truth of observation, tells, in Kirig Lear, 

 how 



Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind, 



for, in the bleak days of Winter, the icy breezes whistle 

 keenly enough amid its leafless branches, and though 

 Goldsmith pictures to us 



The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade 

 For talking age and whispering lovers made, 



it yields, when it has lost its mantling of foliage, poor 

 screen indeed against the wintry blast, the driving snow. 



The clustering May blossoms give place later on to the 

 crimson berries that we figure in our illustration, and 

 these are oftentimes so numerous that the general efi^ect of 

 the tree at a little distance is that of a crimson spot in 



