THE PHAR. 
Py'rus commu'nis L. 
SPRING, with the bursting of green leaf-buds and the 
joyous opening of many blossoms, is essentially the 
season of hope. The colours of summer have not yet 
come: many of the trees put forth their blossoms, as 
it were, prematurely upon leafless boughs, and those 
blossoms are often of a chilly whiteness that might 
be expected to depress the spirits so recently emanci- 
pated from the dull thraldom of winter frosts; but 
the promise of verdure and warmer colour is here, 
and man refuses to be depressed. 
The Pear puts forth its snowy blossoms at a date 
when snow can hardly be assumed to be a thing 
entirely of the past, so that the trees massed in 
orchards suggest lingering snowdrifts ; but before the 
blossoms fall the green leaves have generally made 
their appearance among them, and the likeness to 
snowdrifts is gone. 
The Pear (Pyrus communis L.), so well known in 
our orchards, is by no means common in a wild state, 
and does not occur in the extreme North of England 
or in Scotland. No doubt it is in many cases an 
escape from gardens, its seeds being often swallowed 
and dropped by fruit-eating birds, so that some 
botanists deny its claim to rank as an indigenous 
British tree, and date its introduction from the time 
of the Roman occupation of our island. N evertheless, 
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