fine fruit, but also for its handsome leaves, exquisite blossoms, and delicious perfume.

Mr. Moore gives a pleasant picture of the Orange-tree, in his Paradise and the Peri.

"Just then beneath some orange-trees,

Whose fruit and blossoms in the breeze
Were wantoning together, free,

Like age at play with infancy.”

The Orange-tree is one of the very few which at once delight us with the promise of spring, and the ripe luxuriance of summer. The poet tells us in his notes, that from the Orange-trees of Kauzeroon the bees cull a celebrated honey.

"In short

All the sweet cups to which the bees resort,

With plots of grass, and perfumed walks between,
Of citron, honeysuckle, and jessamine,

With orange whose warm leaves so finely suit,
And look as if they 'd shade a golden fruit."

STORY OF RIMINI.

The orange upon its bough looks, indeed, like sunshine playing in the shade; its large green leaves have a happy effect in softening its brilliancy, and nothing can better harmonize than this fine fruit with its foliage. The poets frequently speak of the leaves as of a shade to the orange:

"He hangs in shade the orange bright,

Like golden lamps in a green night."

ANDREW MARVELL.

Through the green shade the golden orange glows."

ARMSTRONG.

"Thus was this place

A happy rural seat of various view :

Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm ;

Others whose fruit, burnished with golden rind,

Hung amiable, Hesperian fables true,

If true, here only, and of delicious taste."

PARADISE LOST, Book Fourth.

Cowper places the Orange in his green-house :

." The golden boast

Of Portugal and western India there,

The ruddier orange, and the paler lime,

Peep through their polished foliage at the storm,
And seem to smile at what they need not fear.”
COWPER'S TASK.

"The garden of Proserpina this hight,
And in the midst thereof a silver seat
With a thick arbour goodly overdight,
In which she often used from open heat
Herself to shroud, and pleasures to entreat.
Next thereunto did grow a goodly tree,
With branches broad dispread, and body great,
Clothed with leaves that none the wood mote see,
And loden all with fruit, as thick as thick might be.

"The fruit were golden apples glistering bright,
That goodly was their glory to behold,
On earth like never grew, ne living wight
Like ever saw; but they from hence were sold
For those which Hercules with conquest bold
Got from great Atlas' daughters; hence began,
And planted there, did bring forth fruit of gold,
And those with which th' Eubœan young man wan
Swift Atalanta, when through craft he her outran.

"Here also sprang that goodly golden fruit,

With which Acontius got his lover true,

Whom he had long time sought with fruitless suit ;
Here eke that famous golden apple grew,

The which emong the gods false Ate threw,
For which th' Idæan ladies disagreed,

Till partial Paris dempt it Venus' due,

And had (of her) fair Helen for his meed,

That many noble Greeks and Trojans made to bleed."
SPENSER'S FAIRY QUEEN.

"Her lover's genius formed

A glittering fane, where rare and alien plants
Might safely flourish: where the citron sweet
And fragrant orange, rich in fruit and flowers,

Y

Might hang their silver stars, their golden globes,
On the same odorous stem

MASON'S ENGLISH GARDen.

Mrs. C. Smith speaks of the Orange-tree in her lines addressed to the humming-bird; a beautiful little creature, which, when stript of its plumage, is not bigger than a bee; and, like the bee, it delights in hovering over the sweetest flowers, and sipping their juice, without doing them the least injury by its visit. Mr. Lambert, in his Travels in Canada, says, "that they may be seen there in great numbers, and that their plumage is as beautiful as that of the peacock. It is frequently called the bee-bird :

"There, lovely bee-bird! may'st thou rove
Through spicy vale, and citron grove,
And woo and win thy fluttering love

With plume so bright ;

There rapid fly, more heard than seen,
Mid orange-boughs of polished green,
With glowing fruit, and flowers between

Of purest white."

Captain Stedman, speaking of Paramaribo, says that its streets, which are perfectly straight, are lined with Orange, shaddock, tamarind, and lemon trees, which appear in everlasting bloom, while at the same time their branches are weighed down with the richest clusters of odoriferous fruit. He was in the habit of purchasing forty oranges for sixpence : yet plentiful as they were, the Orange is not a native of the country, but was originally imported there from Spain and Portugal. These trees are extremely beautiful, and adorned with their fragrant blossoms throughout the year. "As for the fine fragrance that is diffused through all this colony," says the Captain, "by the continued groves of Orangeblossoms, and odoriferous fruits that it produces, it can be more easily conceived than described." In Surinam, the parlour floors are always scowered with sour oranges cut

through the middle, which gives the house an agreeable fragrance the negro girls, taking one half in each hand, keep singing aloud while they rub the boards.

Speaking of the negro, Captain Stedman says-" his teeth are constantly kept as white as ivory: for this purpose he uses nothing but a prig of Orange-tree, bitten at one end until the fibres resemble a small brush; and no negro, male or female, is to be seen without this little instrument, which has, besides, the virtue of sweetening the breath*."

Thunberg speaks of a curious Lilliputian kind of Orange, growing in Japan: "A very small species of Orange (Citrus Japonica) is frequently cultivated in the houses, in pots. This shrub hardly exceeds six inches in height, and its fruit, which is sweet and palatable, like China Oranges, is not larger than an ordinary cherry †.

PEONY.

PEONIA.

RANUNCULACEE.

POLYANDRIA DIGYNIA.

From Pæon, an eminent physician of antiquity. It is also a name given both to Apollo and to Esculapius.-French, la pivoine; pione : in the village dialect, herbe de mallet; flor de mallet.—Italian, rosa de' monti [mountain rose].

THE Peony, from the nature of its roots, requires very deep pots. There are many and beautiful varieties. The White-flowered Peony is a native of Siberia: it is a handsome flower, with the scent of the Narcissus.

The Daurians boil the roots in their broth, and grind the seeds to put into their tea: they call it Dschina.

• Captain Stedman's Expedition to Surinam, Vol. I. pages 298, 304, 306, 313, 362. Vol. II. p. 293.

+ Thunberg's Travels, Vol. IV. p. 121.

The Common Peony is purple or red: there are single and double flowers. It is a native of many parts of Europe, of Mount Ida, China, and Japan. A variety which Millar calls the Foreign, Gerarde calls Turkish, and says it originally came from Constantinople. The Portugal variety is a single flower, but very sweet this requires a lighter soil and a warmer situation than the other kinds. Although the Peony is better adapted for the open ground, it is too beautiful to be dispensed with, where room can be allowed the Jagged kind is the least fit for pots, and by far the least desirable.

:

The immense crimson flower of the Double-red Peony is scarcely more magnificent than its luxuriant foliage.

They may be increased by parting the roots, observing to preserve a bud on the crown of each offset, and not to divide them very small: they should be planted three inches deep. It is a hardy plant, and will grow in any soil or situation. They should be kept moderately moist. The Common Peony flowers in May; the White Peony a month later.

PASSION-FLOWER.

PASSIFLORA.

PASSIFLOREA.

GYNANDRIA PENTANDRIA.

The Passion-flower derives its name from an idea, that all the instruments of Christ's passion are represented in it.-French, le grenadille; fleur de la passion.-Italian, granadiglia; fiore della passione.

MOST of the Passion-flowers are natives of the hottest parts of America, and require a stove in this country. It is a beautiful genus. The rose-coloured Passion-flower is a native of Virginia, and is the species which was first known in Europe. It has since been in great measure