92 THE MAGAZINE OF HORTICULTURE. 



appointing a business committee the society proceeded to dis- 

 cuss the merits of various fruits. A very fine display of 

 apples was made by the members, ]Mr. R. L. Benedict pre- 

 senting upwards of sixty varieties. We shall endeavor to 

 notice the report more at length in our next. 



New Plums. — Mr. E. Dorr, of Albany, has given an ac- 

 count of three or four new seedling plums, in the Country 

 Gentleman. One of them, the Wax plum, Mr. Dorr politely 

 presented us specimens of, at the late fair of the New York 

 State Agricultural Society, in New York, where he exhibited 

 them : but they decayed before we reached home. It is a 

 beautiful fruit, and we shall notice it with the others in 

 another number. 



STUDIES IN THE FIELD AND FOREST. 



BY WILSON FLAGG. 



No. I. — The Pleasures of a Winter Ramble. 



FEBRUARY. 



The deeper gloom of Winter is dispelled, 



An earlier, longer daylight is beheld, 



The skies are clearer, and the hues of heaven 



Are brighter in our morning and our even. 



The landscape is more radiant, and the sun 



Shines more serenely, when his course is run. 



Each waking dawn is fairer than the last : 



Our melancholy days are nearly past, 



And every omen from the earth or sky 



Tells that a happier season is hard by. 



Earth is more lovely drest in flowers, and while 



Autumn's gay splendors make the prospect smile, 



Yet there's a deep and still sublimity 



Pervading all the breadth of land and sea. 



That may beguile the rambler, till he hails 



The vernal flowers and April's spicy gales. 



It is one of the most cheerful of employments for a leisure 

 hour, to go out into the fields, under a mild open sky, to 

 study the various appearances of nature that accompany the 

 changes of the seasons, and to note those phenomena which 

 are peculiar to a climate of frost and snow. The inhabitant 



