54 WILD FLOWEES OF SPPJNG. 



mental red fruit, which in Sweden and Norway is eaten 

 with honey and flour. The branches yield a yellow 

 dye, and the wood is used for a variety of purposes, 

 that of tobacco-pipe stems not being the least impor- 

 tant. 



If in our springtide walk we pass the solitary cottage 

 by the wayside, we shall see the Elder tree (Sam- 

 lucus nigra) in blossom. Its well-known pinnate 

 leaves and stout arms are planted by the wayside to 

 keep off the witches, or to gather the flowers, which 

 are made into an ointment, or to permit the berries to 

 ripen, with a view to the making of the cottagers' 

 winter cordial elderberry wine. The pithy wood is 

 made by boys into popguns, by butchers into skewers, 

 and the old yeomen thought highly of it for their 

 arrows. The Dwarf Elder ($. ebulus) is known as 

 Danewort. 



The Box shrub (Buxus sempervirens), so useful to 

 the wood engraver and the turner, is only indigenous in 

 England at Boxhill in Surrey, and the prickly Holly 

 (Ilex aquifolium) , are now in bloom. The leaves of the 

 latter are stated to be equal to Peruvian bark in the 

 cure of intermittent fevers. The root and leaves have 

 valuable medicinal properties, and birdlime is made 



