DECIDUOUS ORNAMENTAL TREES. 
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and legendary associations which belong to it in England ; 
for scarcely any tree is richer in such than this. With the 
floral games of May , this plant, from its blooming at that 
period, and being the favourite of the season, has become so 
identified, that the blossoms are known in many parts of 
Britain chiefly by that name. Among the ancient Greeks 
and Romans, they were dedicated to Flora, whose festival 
began on the first of that month ; and in the olden times of 
merry England, the May-pole, its top decked with the gayest 
garlands of these blossoms, was raised amid the shouts of 
the young and old assembled to celebrate this happy rustic 
festival. Chaucer alludes to the custom, and describes the 
hawthorn thus : 
Marke the faire blooming of the Hawthorne tree, 
Which finely cloathed in a robe of white, 
Fills full the wanton eye with May’s delight. 
Court of Love. 
And Herrick has left us the following lines to 11 Corrina 
going a Maying 
“ Come, my Corrina, come ; and coming, marke 
How eche field turns a street, eche street a park 
Made green, and trimmed with trees ; see how 
Devotion gives eche house a bough 
Or branch ; eche porch, eche doore ere this, 
An arke, a tabernacle is, 
Made up of Hawthorne, neatly interwove, 
As if here were those cooler shades of love.” 
The following lines descriptive of the English species, we 
extract from the “ Romance of Nature 
Come let us rest this hawthorn tree beneath, 
And breathe its luscious fragrance as it flies, 
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