100 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1898. 



it may be a bit of prejudice, however I notice John Burroughs 

 repeats the heresy, — that our birds sing more in England than 

 here. It may be that multiplied centuries of the companion- 

 ship of men have made the birds more tame than here, where 

 we have not a thickly populated country yet. Then the wild 

 flowers, in that moist, warm climate are more abundant among 

 the hedge-rows that meet the sight everywhere. But the joy 

 of going Maying I know was just in the going after all. And 

 it is an old, old, wonderful story, this Maying. It leads to 

 what I want to say to you this afternoon. The English chil- 

 dren are late comers at it. Why long, long ago, before there 

 was an English child, or any human child, the bees and the 

 butterflies and the tiny creatures of the air, went a-maying. 



The blossoms and the insects, as of course many of you 

 know, grew up here together in the great process of creation. 

 Where we find no trace of the birds or butterflies, there we find 

 no trace of plants that blossom and fill the air with fragrance 

 and brightness. We find instead tokens of a great rank, blos- 

 somless, colorless vegetation ; and you know the familiar story 

 which Mr. Darwin tells us so eloquently in one of his books, 

 upon the fertilization of the plants by means of the insects, who 

 take their pay in honey. He tells us how the blossoms and 

 the colors of the flower make the plant's advertisement, 

 "Honey here!" and for that simplest little service it ofiers 

 that sweet reward. 



The first human children and their mothers and fathers found 

 the flowers here ; of that we are pretty certain nowadays. 

 And what is all this talk of endless competition in the world, 

 so hard and selfish? Why, it has been a matter of mutual 

 helpfulness and co-operation from the start. I know of no 

 better illustration of it than the way in which the bees, the 

 butterflies, and the blooming plants have grown up together, 

 owing everything to one another's mutual love. The hawthorn 

 flower and the hawthorn fruit are full of meaning, more than I 

 can tell you in the time you can allow me. 



I dare say you have seen the little fruit of the hawthorn. 

 The way we children used to cull it and love it ! I remember 



