Stray Leaves from a Border Garden 
garden crammed with Lilies. Sir John Mandeville asserts 
that our Lord’s Crown of Thorns was made of the Albie- 
spyne — that is, White Thorn, what we call the Hawthorn 
now, and, in consequence, any man who bears a sprig about 
him is safe in a thunderstorm, and “ in the howse that it is 
ynne may non evil ghost enter.” In Ireland and Brittany 
it is called “ Fairy-thorn,” and it is deemed unlucky to cut 
down Thorn-trees. There is a quaint old saying, “No man 
but has a thornbush nigh his door”; meaning, “No man 
is exempt from trouble.” Further, “ this prickly vegetable,” 
saith my old Forester’s treatise, is “ the greatest security of 
almost all others to the Farmer and Gardener for preventing 
the breaking in of Cattel to Fields of Corn, Gardens and 
Orchards (Pomeries, as was the quaint old Scotch term for 
orchards) ; and will resist the Bite and Cropping of all 
sorts of Beasts. . . . And to the Good Housewife it is 
one of the most necessary Sorts to hang her Linnen on to 
dry the Greatest Part of the Year, when it is kept Clipped. 
.... It is also a Shelter and a Refuge for Singing 
Birds to breed and chant in ; and an admirable Sweet 
Ornament in the Spring season by its fine white Blossom, 
for a considerable Time.” 
I believe wine has been made of Haws, but I have not as 
yet made the experiment myself, or found anybody who 
has, nor indeed come across any recipe therefor. This is 
the year for specially fine meteors, prophesied, I believe, 
thirty years ago to recur about this time. I spent a long 
time last night at the window watching for meteors. The 
garden looked so eerie in the odd light of 3 a.m., I felt as 
if I should not have been surprised to see any number of 
ghosts come marching along the avenue by the big Fir- 
tree. But I saw nothing, not even one falling star. Other 
people were more lucky, I believe. I remember when I 
was a child how — the year of the Franco-Prussian War— 
the Northern Lights were said to be particularly fine, and 
current report declared it portended bloody disturbances. 
There was an old Scotch belief the Streamers or Merry 
Dancers first appeared before the bloody days of Tj, and 
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