346 



FLORA AND SYLVA, 



cores are cleared by pressing through a 

 sieve or cloth, the pulp makes a good 

 sauce for game, or delicious puddings 

 of distinct flavour. With more sugar, 

 the same paste maybe made into jam or 

 thickened as conserve, or the fruits may 

 be preserved in syrup as a sweetmeat. 

 Perhaps their greatest value is for jelly, 

 and for this the fruits should hang until 

 mellow, whereas for eating they are best 

 while crisp and fresh. Pink and clear 

 jellies may be had from a wise choice of 

 kinds, of which Late Red Siberian and 

 Dartmouth Crab yield a pretty colour, 

 while such as yohn Dowuie, the Fairy 

 Apple, and Transparent give a clear 

 jelly. A refreshing drink for thirsty colds 

 or the sick room generally may be made 

 by pouring boilingwater over the cooked 

 fruits, lightly mashed. 



Few groups have given botanists 

 more trouble than this, and no two au- 

 thorities are ever quite agreed as to the 

 classing of forms and hybrids of un- 

 certain origin. For ease of reference it 

 is well to follow the division of the order 

 Pyrus, by which the forms of Apple are 

 classed together in the section Ma/us — 

 a group large and distinct enough to save 

 confusion with other sections. Where 

 uncertainty as to species occurs it will 

 be briefly noted in our list of kinds; the 

 many garden varieties with fancy names, 

 many of which have come to us from 

 America, are classed apart with brief 

 descriptions. 



Narrow - leaved Crab [Pyrus angusti- 

 folia). — A low tree of 15 or 20 feet, often called 

 the Evergreen Crab from the fact that its nar- 

 row shining leaves remain all through a mild 

 winter. The flowers, borne in clusters during 

 May andjune, are red in the bud, expandingto 

 a pale blush, and very sweet ; the fruits are small, 



green, and intensely sour. This is one of the 

 old American kinds, in cultivation since 1750, 

 and now too rarely seen in our gardens. It 

 grows in the low woods of Carolina, coming 

 near the Garland Crab (P. coronarid) of which 

 it is often classed as a variety, and to which the 

 double-flowered form of this more correctly 

 belongs. Syn. P. sempervirens. 



The Russian Crab (P. astracanica). — A 

 tree found wild in southern Russia, varieties of 

 j which have long been grown under the name 

 of Red and White Astrachan Crabs. The Red 

 ; Astrachan bears fruit of a bright red with deli- 

 ! cate purple bloom, and theWhite kind is known 

 in English nurseries as the Transparent Crab. 

 It makes a pretty tree, with yellow wax-like 

 fruits and a beautiful bloom. 



The Siberian Crab [P .baccata). — This is 

 one of the tallest of the wild kinds, reaching 30 

 to 35 feet in its pyramidal forms. It is a state- 

 ly tree for lawns, or grouped among tall trees 

 in glades of the pleasure garden, distinct in 

 its long-stemmed drooping flowers, and when 

 laden with clusters of tiny fruits in autumn. Its 

 leaves are oval, sharply pointed, hard in tex- 

 ture, and long in the stalk. The white flowers 

 come in April and May and are scented in some 

 forms; the small pea-like fruits are of brilliant 

 red and yellow, hanging long after the leaves, 

 in mild winters even into the new year. These 

 fruits, however, vary in size in the many forms 

 of baccata, those coming nearest prunifolia 

 bearing berries like a large Cherry. The forms 

 of this species may be known by the absence 

 of the "eye" from the top of the fruit, formed 

 by the dry and persistent calyx; in this species 

 it falls off during growth, affording an easy 

 means of identification. Covering a vast area 

 from Siberia and the Himalayas eastward, and 

 long grown in the gardens of China and Japan, 

 I its wild and garden forms run into other spe- 

 cies to thedespair of thebotanist. Someauthors 

 have classed the many intermediate forms to- 

 gether as the Cherry-fruited Crabs (P. cerasi- 

 fera) and much difficulty is thereby avoided; 

 others class them all with this kind or pruni- 

 folia. The tree known as the Winter Crab, 

 or Bigg's Everlasting (P. borea/is), really 

 belongs to this intermediate class. It is of 

 robust growth, with a dense head and pretty 

 drooping habit, carrying its leaves and bright 

 red fruits nearly all winter. There is another 



