WHITE 



SHAD-BUSH. JUNE-BERRY. SERVICE-BERRY. 



Amelanchier oblongifolia. Rose Family. 



A tall shrub or small tree found in low ground. Leaves. Oblong ; 

 acutely pointed; finely toothed; mostly rounded at base. Flowers. 

 White; growing in racemes. Calyx. Five-cleft. Corolla. Of five rather 

 long petals. Stamens. Numerous; short. Pistils. With five styles. 

 Fruit. Round; red; sweet and edible ; ripening in June. 



Down in the boggy meadow, in early March, we can almost 

 fancy that from beneath the solemn purple cowls of the skunk- 

 cabbage brotherhood comes the joyful chorus 



" For lo, the winter is past ! " 



but we chilly mortals still find the wind so frosty and the woods 

 so unpromising that we return shivering to the fireside, and re- 

 fuse to take up the glad strain till the feathery clusters of the 

 shad-bush droop from the pasture thicket. Then only are we 

 ready to admit that 



' ' The flowers appear upon the earth, 

 The time of the singing of birds is come. " 



Even then, search the woods as we may, we shall hardly find 

 thus early in April* another shrub in blossom, unless it be the 

 spice-bush, whose tiny honey-yellow flowers escape all but the 

 careful observer. The shad-bush has been thus named because 

 of its flowering at the season when shad "run; " June-berry, 

 because the shrub's crimson fruit surprises us by gleaming from 

 the copses at the very beginning of summer ; service-berry, be- 

 cause of the use made by the Indians of this fruit, which they 

 gathered in great quantities, and, after much crushing and 

 pounding, made into a sort of cake. 



