112 CRANBERRIES. 
The soil in which it best flourishes is a loose black 
earth. The only inconveniences attending it in planta- 
tions is the early shedding of its leaves. 
In the spring of the year the inhabitants of some 
parts of Scotland bore holes through the bark of the 
sycamore, at the distance of about twelve inches from 
the root, and suffer the juice to drain into vessels, to the 
amount of eight or nine quarts a day from each tree. 
This liquor they convert into a kind of wine ; and, if 
the watery part were evaporated, a useful sugar might 
be obtained from it. 
The wood of the sycamore is soft and white, and was 
formerly much in request by turners, for making tren- 
chers, dishes, bowls, and other articles ; but, since the 
general introduction of earthen-ware for all these pur- 
poses, its value has greatly decreased. 
123. CRANBERRIESareasmall red fruit with purple dots 9 
produced by a slender wiry plant (Vaccinium oxycoccos), which 
grows in the peaty bogs of several parts of the north of England, 
and also in Norfolk, Lincolnshire, and Cambridgeshire. 
The leaves are small, somewhat oval, and rolled back at the 
edges, and the stem is thread-shaped and trailing. The blossoms 
are small, but beautiful, each consisting of four distinct petals 
rolled back to the base, and ofdeepjlesh colour. 
The collecting of cranberries is a tiresome and dis- 
agreeable employment, as each berry, which seldom ex- 
ceeds the size of a pea, grows on a separate stalk, and 
the morasses in which they grow are frequently very 
deep. Cranberries are much used in the northern 
counties, and great quantities of them are bottled and 
sent to London. So considerable a traffic in this fruit 
is carried on, that, at Longtown in Cumberland, the 
amount of a market day's sale, during the season for 
gathering it, is stated by Dr. Withering to be from 9.01. 
to SO/. Cranberries begin to ripen about the month of 
August, and continue in perfection for some weeks. 
They are much used in confectionary, but par- 
ticularly in tarts ; their rich flavour being very ge- 
