TOO 



good works is like dates sweet, and ripen- 

 ing late." For date read persimmon, and 

 you are not far off the truth. Persimmons 

 grow often in the woods, but reach their last 

 and best estate here in the old field. It is 

 a wonderfully vital plant. A chance-sown 

 seed will be in three years a tree coming 

 into fruit. One, too, that can be got rid of 

 only by the most rigorous grubbing. June 

 sees its green flowers full of subtlest sylvan 

 fragrance. Six weeks later all the twigs are 

 sown along their under sides with hard, pale- 

 green spheroids that in two months more are 

 yellow and dusted over with whitish-purple 

 bloom. 



Thenceforward they merely hang high till 

 the time of killing frost. If that keeps off till 

 December, your true persimmony persimmon 

 clings to its roughness, albeit here and there 

 an early faint-heart is eatable. Master Pos- 

 sum is the best guide to such an one. He 

 is at once connoisseur and epicure, whose 

 taste you may safely follow. Most trees are 

 sweet and stripped by Christmas. The very 

 roughest hang on until February a special 

 providence to all manner of wild things, 

 when their usual larders are deep under the 

 snow. 



If chance sets such fruit in your way, taste 



