THE ROWAN, OR MOUNTAIN ASH 103 



on the tree until the leaves have changed colour and 

 fallen ; but though the not unwholesome acid fruits 

 are not now much molested by man, they are peculiar 

 favourites with the birds, so much so that Yirgil 

 speaks of the tree as attracting thrushes to any grove 

 in which it grew. In Northern Russia, where this 

 tree abounds, the annual ripening of its berries is 

 marked by an immigration of the Bohemian wax- 

 wing. The flesh of the fruit is of a bright orange- 

 yellow, as may often be seen in the many wounds 

 the beaks of innumerable finches and thrushes will 

 make in the riddled clusters, while the core is so hard 

 as to connect the species, as ,has been said, with the 

 Medlar and the Hawthorn. 



The undigested seeds of the fruits of this species 

 eaten by birds, or of those of the Service-trees eaten by 

 squirrels or hedgehogs, germinate more speedily than 

 when sown directly in the ground, and may also 

 benefit by being carried to some little distance. 



The leaves, in turning, most frequently become 

 yellowish, and decay on the tree to an unornamental 

 brown ; but in exceptional situations, or in very 

 favourable autumns — perhaps mostly when the end of 

 September and beginning of October are unusually 

 dry — they, too, become red, and then, as a poetess has 

 said — 



" The scarlet Kowan seems to mock 



The red sea-coral — berries, leaves, and all 

 Light swinging from the moist, green, shining rook 

 Which beds the foaming torrent's turbid fall." 



The writer has here happily suggested an appro- 

 priate situation for the tree. It likes a moist but not a 



