THE GUELDER-ROSE 79 



When in flower its leaves are still of a bright clear 

 green that enhances the purity of the snowy inflpr- 

 ■escence, and in many a suburban garden affords a 

 pleasing contrast with the dark vinous hue of the 

 €opper Beech or the clusters of the pink May. The 

 wild form, too, by many a stream and in many a 

 moist hedgerow, exhibits the beauty of perfect vitality 

 — a charm free from the saddening suggestions of 

 autumn, whose splendours are but the immediate 

 forerunners of decay. By July the leaves have lost 

 their freshness, and the blossoms have, in the wild 

 form, given place to inconspicuous clusters of loosely- 

 grouped green berries of an oval outline ; but in 

 August these latter begin to turn in colour, reddening 

 to a pure and limpid crimson like drops of trans- 

 3)arent blood or rubies from the trees in the garden of 

 Aladdin. This is an autumnal glory denied to the 

 sterile variety ; but in October the leaves of wild and 

 ■cultivated form alike glow with an added charm : a 

 blush of rosy pink suiFuses the margin of a leaf, 

 spreads to the centre or from lobe to lobe, deepens 

 to a rich claret colour, and may fade at its edges to a 

 golden yellow. We are not surprised that we have 

 seen the beautiful flower-clusters of the Wild Guelder- 

 rose hawked in London streets in June, its jewel-like 

 berries offered for sale in September, and its rose- 

 coloured leaves in the same market in October ; but 

 it will be difficult for the hedgerows to sustain for 

 long this triple tax of a huge metropolis with a 

 growing sense of the beautiful. 



Per contra, the green wood and the decaying fruit 

 have such an unpleasantly fetid odour that the tree 



