CHERRIES ARE RIPE. 119 



But the ultimate origin of the pulpiness in plums and 

 cherries was quite antecedent to any particular adoption 

 of their stocks in the primitive orchards of early man. 

 So far as we can now tell, the roses do not date back in 

 time beyond the tertiary period of geology. The very 

 earliest members of the family still extant are little 

 creeping herbs, like cinquefoil and silver-weed, with yel- 

 low blossoms (all primitive blossoms, indeed, are yellow) 

 and small, dry, inedible seeds. The strawberry is the 

 lowest type of rose above these very simple forms. It 

 is still a creeping herb, and its seeds are still small, dry, 

 and inedible ; but they are imbedded in a juicy pulp 

 which entices birds to swallow them, and so aid in dis- 

 persing them under circumstances peculiarly favorable 

 to their due germination and growth. Next in order 

 after this earliest rude succulent type (nature's first 

 rough sketch of a fruit, so to speak ; and a very suc- 

 cessful one too, from the human point of view at least) 

 come the blackberry and raspberry ; where the individ- 

 ual fruitlets grow soft, sweet, and pulpy, instead of re- 

 maining dry as in the strawberry. And this change 

 clearly marks a step in advance ; so that blackberries 

 and raspberries are enabled to get along with fewer 

 seeds, and yet to thrive much better in the struggle for 

 life too seeing that they have developed into stout 

 wood trailers, often forming considerable thickets, and 

 killing down all the lesser vegetation beneath and 

 between them. Again, the dog-roses show still higher 

 development, alike in their erect bushy form, in then- 

 large pink flowers, and in their big scarlet hips which 

 are uneatable by us, it is true, but are great favorites 

 with birds in severe winters. The haws of the white 

 thorn are even more successful in attracting the robins 

 and other non-migratory allies ; and the white thorn has 



