162 OUR COMMON FRUITS. 



upon drooping stalks among the small serrated and de- 

 ciduous leaves ; and, in gathered sprays, the plants inter- 

 spersed among more showy flowers, would be found to 

 form a very pleasing feature in a bouquet. 



CHAPTEB XIII. 



THE ORANGE AND ITS ALLIES, THE LEMON, 

 CITRON, AND SHADDOCK. 



" O that I were an orange-tree, 



That busy plant ! 

 Then should I always laden be, 



And never want 

 Some fruit for him that dresseth me." G. HEKBEKT. 



SUMMER'S light fruits have long since fled, and the 

 more substantial stores of autumn, if lingering still, have 

 yet lost much of their freshness and their flavour. Where- 

 with, then, shall we temper the dryness of our dessert ? 

 "Where seek some natural nectar, pure and cool, which 

 may allay the ferment of young blood heated by winter's 

 festivities, and moisten the parched lip of the fever- 

 stricken sufferer, longing, above all, for the refreshment 

 only to be found in the dewy juice of newly-gathered 

 fruits ? A welcome answer is wafted on Atlantic breezes 

 by a myriad white-winged messengers of commerce ; and, 

 plentiful as the most abundant of our home-grown pro- 

 duce, cheap almost as the cheapest berry of English birth, 

 the healthful and delicious Orange is poured upon our 

 shores a luxury grateful to the highest and attainable 

 by the lowest in the land. With what enthusiasm would 

 the ancient Greek have hailed such a crowning gift of 

 Pomona ! what charming myths would have been in- 

 vented to account for its origin ! what lore of legends 

 would have gathered round it as ages rolled by ! for, if 

 the dry coarse-husked walnut was deemed golden and god- 

 like, and could exercise so much influence on their vivid 

 imaginations (as shown in Dr. Sickler's Hesperidean hypo- 



