438 DECIDUOUS TREES. 



THORN TREES. Cratagus. 



Mostly low, flat-headed trees. Though some of the prettiest 

 varieties of the tree-thorns in the world are growing wild in all the 

 States, they are so common, and their varieties so numerous, that 



they have been little valued and rarely 



FIG. 144. 3 / 



grown in nurseries or pleasure grounds. 



The English hawthorn, of which so 

 much has been said and sung, is infe- 

 rior in foliage to some of our native va- 

 rieties, and but little superior in flow- 

 ers or fruit. The varieties of native 

 thorn trees are almost as numerous 

 as apples in a nursery catalogue, and our descriptions must be 

 limited to a few species and varieties, at the risk of leaving un- 

 noticed many of conspicuous beauty. Nearly all of them are 

 observable for the sharpness of their thorns, their abundant clusters 

 of blossoms in May, their dense growth and low-spreading forms. 

 On most varieties the foliage masses in horizontal and rather thin 

 stratifications, especially in the crus-galli members of the family. 

 The fruit is generally red, varying from the size of a pea to that of 

 a cherry. The larger sorts have a perfumed and quite agreeable 

 flavor, and are known as thorn-apples. The abundance of the 

 fruit gives a ruddy tone to the trees in August and September, and 

 a few sorts are planted in England for the beauty of the fruit alone. 

 All the species may be clipped into good hedges, but some va- 

 rieties of the crus-galli are the best adapted for that purpose. 



The blossoms and fruit are borne in clusters, the former gene- 

 rally white, and the latter red, though there are varieties with bright- 

 colored blossoms, and yellow, green, and black fruit. The time 

 of their flowering varies in the different sorts from March to July, 

 but most varieties bloom about the last of May, and ripen their 

 fruit in September. 



Whether we look at their blossoms, their glossy leaves, their 

 dense low growth, the clearly marked lights and shadows of their 

 foliage, their facility for trimming into hedges or other artificial 



