150 
THE MORAL OF FLOWERS. 
branch after Michaelmas day; believing, with a credulity 
which would not have disgraced the days of popery, the 
vulgar superstition that on that day the devil casts his 
club over the fruit ? It is amusing to see how gravely 
Threlkeld rebuts the tradition. “ I look upon this as a 
vulgar error,” says he, “ that the devil casts his club 
over them after Michaelmas ; for the earth is the Lord’s, 
and the fulness thereof.” 
But, whilst reviving these youthful recollections, we 
must not forget to notice the connection this plant has 
with the popular nursery ballad—“The Babes in the 
Wood.” However successfully the rising emotion had 
been combated in the preceding stanzas, the following 
lines, even at the hundredth repetition, 'were sure to 
open the floodgates of childish sorrow : — 
“ Their little hands and pretty lips 
With blackberries were dyed. 
And when they saw the darksome night 
They sat them down and cried.” 
Nor must Beattie’s allusion to 
“ This tale of rural life, a tale of woes, 
The orphan babes, and guardian uncle fierce,” 
