THE IVY. 85 



the sweet liquor that distils from the nectary of 

 this plant. As this honey is produced in succes- 

 sion by the early or later expansion of the bud, it 

 yields a constant supply of food, till the frosts of 

 November destroy the insects, or drive them to their 

 winter retreats. Spring arrives ; and in the bitter 

 months of March, April, and even May at times, 

 when the wild products of the field are nearly con- 

 sumed, the ivy ripens its berries, and then almost 

 entirely constitutes the food of the missel thrush, 

 wood-pigeon, and some other birds ; and now these 

 shy and wary birds, that commonly avoid the 

 haunts of man, constrained by hunger, will ap- 

 proach our dwellings, to feed upon the ripe berries 

 of the ivy. Now, too, the blackbird and the thrush 

 resort to its cover, to conceal their nests. These 

 early-building birds find little foliage at this period 

 sufficient to hide their habitations ; and did not 

 the ivy lend its aid to preserve them, and no great 

 number are preserved, perhaps few nests would be 

 hidden from the young eyes that seek them. The 

 early expansion of the catkins of the sallow (salix 

 caprea) , and others of the willow tribe, whence the 

 bee extracts its first food, and the late blooming of 

 this ivy, are indispensable provisions for the exist- 

 ence of many of the insect race ; the " young raven 

 does not cry in vain," nor is any thing abandoned 

 by that Power which called it into being. 

 We all seem to love the ivy 



The wanton ivy, wreath'd in amorous twines, 



more than any other uncultured evergreen that we 



