UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 
feits in nature — known to me. Some of our wild 
flowers are named “ false” this and that, as false 
indigo, false Solomon’s-seal, false mitrewort, and 
others; but in designating them thus we are simply 
slandering Nature and exposing our own ignorance. 
Other things come to mind that are not what 
they seem, or what they are popularly called; 
“cedar plums,” for instance, — those yellow fungous 
growths upon the branches of the red cedar which 
suddenly develop with the rain and warmth of May 
or June, and that look like ripe fruit upon the tree. 
In sun and dryness they soon shrink and wither; on 
the return of a wet day they are again clammy ge- 
latinous masses. Later in the season they disappear 
entirely. They are not the work of an insect, but the 
result of some disease like black-knot on our plum- 
and cherry-trees. They can scarcely be called coun- 
terfeit fruit. The so-called oak-apple bears a some- 
what closer resemblance to a genuine fruit. Its 
stringy texture might be taken for the skeleton of 
the pulp of the apple. It is a gall caused by the 
sting of an insect. The oak is made to grow the cell 
or house in which the young of the insect is hatched 
and developed. The May apples which children 
gather from the wild azalea and eat with much rel- 
ish are also a sham fruit — the work of an insect. 
Can we call the infertile flowers of certain plants, 
like those of the fringed polygala, shams or counter- 
feits? They seem to exist for show merely, while 
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