XIV. THE FRUIT GIFT. 263 



front exquisite forms either of foliage or flower. The 

 vine leaf, in its generally decorative power, is the 

 most important, both in life and in art, of all that 

 shade the habitations of men. The olive leaf is, 

 without any .rival, the most beautiful of the leaves 

 of timber trees; and its blossom, though minute, 

 of extreme beauty. The apple is essentially the 

 fruit of the rose, and the peach of her only rival 

 in her own colour. The cherry and orange blossom 

 are the two types of floral snow. 



16. And, lastly, let my readers be assured, the 

 economy of blossom and fruit, with the distribution 

 of water, will be found hereafter the most accurate 

 test of wise national government. 



For example of the action of a national govern- 

 ment, rightly so called, in these matters, I refer 

 the student to the Mariegolas of Venice, translated 

 in Fors Clavigera; and I close this chapter, and 

 this first volume of Proserpina, not without pride, 

 in the words I wrote on this same matter eighteen 

 years ago. "So far as the labourer's immediate 

 profit is concerned, it matters not an iron filing 

 whether I employ him in growing a peach, or in 

 forging a bombshell. But the difference to him is 

 final, whether, when his child is ill, I walk into his 

 cottage, and give it the peach, — or drop the shell 

 down his chimney, and blow his roof off." 



