823 
that the right hand branch (with intermediate sized flow- 
ers) was more like an apricot than a peach bloom. The 
photo of the large conspicuous white-flowered type some 
did not recognize as being a peach flower, though others 
said that kind was never cultivated in the orchards but 
only for ornament, as it never bore anything but scrubby 
little fruit, bitter and leathery . Now my own recollection, 
though I do not recollect ever having been through a peach 
orchard here in North China during flowering season, only 
passing them in the railway train, is that the orchards 
show white predominatingly, and I distinctly recollect 
trying to get some pink double flowering peach potted 
plants last spring and was rather struck with the fact 
that I could not find anything except clear pure white, as 
you say, not even the cerise colored ones which I know are 
abundant in south and west China and in Japan. Yet the 
ordinary name for pink is peach flower color, and notwith- 
standing the love of Chinese for color, it is used spar- 
ingly, in fact, owing to its being associated with the 
peach blossom, seems to have an unsavory significance, as 
I found when I came home one day with a pink satin brocade 
gown that I had just purchased. My people held up their 
hands in horror, and exclaimed it was a mercy that I did 
not intend to wear that here, it would only do for outside 
countries that did not know about peach flowers, which re- 
marks led me to leave it in America when I came back, 
though it was a very lovely delicate color and one of my 
prettiest gowns. 
"The reason for this prejudice is owing to its sym- 
bolism. Just as the violet is considered in western lands 
to be the symbol of modest worth, so the plum is that of 
feminine virtue in China and the peach flower the oppo- 
site. Not even the beauty of its color, whether delicate 
pink or deep cerise, redeems it from this fatal signifi- 
cance. In order that there may be no possible opportunity 
for a 'peach flower heart' to spring up unawares in some 
girl of respectable family, it is not considered wise to 
plant a peach of any kind near the bed room windows of the 
court yards inhabited by the women, yet peach wands are 
supposed to be especially useful to beat off all evil 
spirits, only they must be plucked during a solar eclipse 
and a hole bored through one end for hanging up by, during 
a lunar eclipse, which perhaps accounts for their fewness, 
as during those times in the old days the people were 
generally busily occupied in beating gongs and firing off 
crackers to drive away the heavenly dogs which were sup- 
posed to be devouring those luminaries, and no one had 
time to think of making peach wands! The lucky possessor 
of an efficacious peach wand is supposed to be able to 
sleep at night with it under his pillow in full confidence 
that no evil spirits can harm him! 
