Imatges de pàgina
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(1) Shrub-like.

R. IDE'US. (Leaves winged, with five or three leafits, hairy beneath; stem nearly erect, prickly; leaf-stalk channelled. E.)

The rains are gone, the storms are o'er ;
Winter retires to make thee way;
Come then, thou sweetly blushing flower,
Come, lovely stranger, come away.
The Sun is dress'd in beaming smiles,
To give thy beauties to the day;
Young Zephyrs wait, with gentlest gales,

To fan thy bosom, as they play." Hervey.

Anacreon tuned his sweetest lays in praise of this most distinguished flower, but with these our readers are already familiar; we therefore present a few unpublished lines by the Rev. y, which will scarcely lose by a comparison even with the gifted song

S

of the Teian :

"I did not mean to mock the Rose,
Nor do her injur'd blossom wrong;
There's not a flower the garden shows
More sacred to the priests of song:
Its fragrance could the Greek inspire,
And breathes in many a Roman line,
Its buds adorn the Persian lyre,

And must not be disgrac'd by mine.
In Spring I watch its first green hue,
Fair promise of a leaf to be;
And, long before it bursts to view,

Its swelling folds have charms for me.
I count each bud with silent hope,
Which Summer ripens into flower;
And when the glowing petals ope,

I treasure them within my bower.
Scarce can the enamour'd Nightingale
More closely woo it for its bride;
The bird which in the Eastern tale,
Sits warbling music at its side.
I love it in its earliest blade;

I love it in its richest bloom;
And when its living blushes fade

I court its memory in perfume."

In Asia prevails the fable of the Rose and Bulbul, so celebrated by Eastern poets.

"For there-the Rose o'er crag or vale,

Sultana to the Nightingale,

Blooms blushing to her lover's tale;

His queen, his garden queen, his Rose;

Returns the sweets by nature given,

In softest incense back to heaven;

And grateful yields that smiling sky,

Her fairest hue and fragrant sigh." Byron.

Moore likewise alludes to the same tender sympathy with his wonted fervour :

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Fl. Dan. 788-(E. Bot. 2442.. E.)-Woodv. 138-Clus. i. 117-Dod. 743. 1

Lob. Obs. 619. 2-Ger. Em. 1272. 2—J. B. ii. 59. 2-Lonic. i. 41. 2

Park. Par. 559. 1-Trag. 973-Ger. 1089. 1-Matth. 1010.

Open her bosom's glowing veil,

Than love shall ever doubt a tone,

A breath of the beloved one."

But to no poet, ancient or modern, of either hemisphere, has occurred, in contemplating these subjects, a more exquisitely beautiful thought than the following by Witherspoon, though devoid of Oriental embellishment:

"O gin my love were yon red Rose,

That grows upon the castle wa'
And I mysel' a drap o' dew

Into her bonie breast to fa'!

Oh, there, beyond expression blest,
I'd feast on beauty a' the night;
Seal'd on her silk-saft faulds to rest,

'Till fley'd awa by Phoebus light."

Not less emblematic of beauty and loveliness than the Myrtle itself, the Rose most aptly designates the tender passion, by its gradual advance from the bud to the full blown flower; and in its different stages was wont to be mutually presented, and if favourably accepted, was deemed the pledge of future felicity. Nor does the simile end with a wild career of passion: it is equally typical of a more permanent, and ever-enduring attach"Because its breath

ment:

Is rich beyond the rest; and, when it dies,

It doth bequeath a charm to sweeten death." B. Cornwall.

The Entomologist will find the Rose far from unattractive. The different species nurture the following insects: Phalana Salicella, Pavonia, Libatrix, Retularia; Tenthredo Rosa, Cynosbati; Ichneumon Bedegauris; Cicada Rosa; Aphis Rose; Scarabæus auratus: Musca pellucens; and those moss-like fibrous excrescences, which are frequently found upon the branches of Roses, especially upon the last species, are the habitations of the Cynips Rose, (a small fly which piercing the tender plant with its sting, sheds a drop of liquid, together with its eggs. But even this apparently secure depository does not escape the penetrating Ichneumon, which bores into the secret chamber, and commits his own destroying egg to the offspring.) The splendid beetle (Cetonia aurata), that beds and bathes in sweetness, nestles into the Rose, and sips its nectar. Coccinella punctata, (Lady-bird), relieves the Rose, (as it does other plants,) by feeding on the innumerable Aphides which often cluster its stem and foliage. These little creatures illustrate the observation of naturalists that the torpidity of insects, as of other hybernating animals, is caused by cold; the same temperature also, in many instances, destroying their usual supply of sustenance. Thus the Aphis, which becomes torpid in winter in the open air, retains its activity, and gives birth to a numerous progeny upon Rose trees preserved in conservatories. The beauty of the Rose is often impaired by the froth of Cicada spumaria, Cuckoo-spit, (than which no insect may be more readily observed, or is more worthy of notice, whilst undergoing its truly surprising transformation :) and also its own peculiar saw-fly, Tenthredo Rose; (vid. Kirby and Spence's Entom. i. 194.) The miniature instrument with which this insect is furnished is far more complete than any similar invention of human ingeruity, being toothed on each side, (the serratures often serrated, and the exterior flat sides scored and toothed,) so that while the vertical effect is that of a saw, it acts laterally as a rasp. When by the alternate motion, (the instrument being in fact composed of two distinct saws) the incision or cell is made, the two saws, receding from each other, conduct the egg between them into it. The economy of the Megachile (Apis) centuncularis is likewise well worthy of attention. This, and some other species, hang the walls of their little cells with portions of leaves, generally selecting those of the Rose-tree, (though not exclusively); and from the dexterity with which they effect this purpose, they have not

Stems upright, or slightly bent, pale, or purplish brown, three or four feet high, biennial, producing fruit the second year, after which they die down, beset with small prickles. (Leaves serrated, their ribs slightly prickly. Fruit-stalks rough. Blossoms white, pendent, panicled. Calyx permanent, woolly, sharp-pointed. E.) Fruit red, fragrant, composed of numerous succulent, single-seeded, grains. E.)

RASPBERRY BUSH. FRAMBOISE. HINDBERRY. (Irish: Maohan Conaire. Welsh: Afanllwyn; Mafonen: Gaelic: Preas-subh-craoibh. E.) Woods and hedges, rocky mountains, and moist situations. Grass Wood, near Kilnsay, Yorkshire. Curtis. Thorpe, near Norwich. Mr. Crowe. Berkhampstead, Herts. Mr. Woodward. Woods to the west of Bishop's Aukland. Mr. Hutchinson. (Abundant in woods near Kidderminster, and Coleshill. Purt. Crackley wood, near Kenilworth. Perry. On the summit of Hingsdon Down, near Moreton, Devon. Rev. J. PikeJones. Wood on the south side of Edgbaston pool, Warwickshire, (though perhaps artificially introduced. E.) In wet woods, and in thickets and rough places near rivulets, common about Birmingham: (under circumstances equally suspicious. Plentiful in the wild woods of Wales. Roslyn, Auchindenny, and Arniston woods. Dr. Greville. In the Highlands. Prof. Hooker. E.) S. May-June.*

inaptly been designated Leaf-cutter Bees. Of the process, Reaumur gives a very interesting account. Nothing can be more expeditious; she is not longer about it than we would be with a pair of scissars. After hovering for some moments over a Rosebush, as if reconnoitring, the bee alights upon the leaf she has chosen, usually taking ber station upon its edge so that the margin passes between her legs. With her strong mandibles she cuts without intermission in a curve line so as to detach a triangular portion. When this bangs by the last fibre, lest its weight should carry her to the ground, she balances her little wings for flight, and the very moment it parts from the leaf, flies off with it in triumph; the detached portion remaining bent between her legs in a direction perpendicular to her body. Thus without rule or compass do these diminutive creatures mete out the materials of their work into portions of an elipse, into orals or circles, accurately accommodating the dimensions of the several pieces of each figure to each other! Easy is it to perceive by whom this humble insect has been taught. The excrescences above mentioned were formerly in repute as a medicine, and kept in the shops under the name of Bedeguar. None of these variations are accidental or common to several of the tribe, but each peculiar to the galls formed by a distinct species of Cynips. Superstitious persons may still be found to attest their efficacy in restraining the intemperate passions of the wearer, but as these are chiefly old women, the improved temper may be accounted for more satisfactorily. At least, equally obsolete and ill-founded is the very ancient idea, that "years of store of haws and heps, do commonly portend cold winters;" for, whatever our almanacs may do, few persons of credit will venture now to predict, from what are called natural causes, either a hot summer, or a severe winter. Towards autumn, scattered on the under side of the leaf, "single and in groups, on a yellow ground; with stems long, and heads elongated, bluntish, black;" will be found the minute fungus, Puccinia Rosa. Grev. Scot. Crypt. 15. Purt. t. 28; nor is it altogether peculiar to this species. Different parts of living Rose-bushes are often infested with whitish tufts of Erotium Rosarum, "silky, creeping at the margin; peridia greenish, sessile, globose, very minute; filaments enveloping the peridia, simple, elongated, jointed. Of rapid growth." Grev. Scot. Crypt. 164. 2. E.)

The fruit is extremely grateful as nature presents it; but made into a sweetmeat, with sugar, or fermented with wine, the flavour is improved. It is fragrant, sub-acid, and cooling. It dissolves the tartarous concretions of the teeth, but for this purpose is inferior to the strawberry. The amber-coloured berries of the garden are sweeter than the crimson; but frequently contaminated by insects. The fresh leaves are the favourite food of kids. (The foliage suffers from the attacks of a little beetle, Melolontha horticola ;

R. CE'SIUS. (Leaves ternate, hairy beneath; lateral ones two-lobed: stem prickly, prostrate, glaucous : calyx embracing the fruit. E.)

E. Bot. 826-Fl. Dan. 1213-Dod. 742. 2.

Stem three feet long, purplish, branched, with pendent shoots at the top. Prickles very fine, scattered, small, bowed back, interspersed between the rough points. Leaves green, not cottony, though often downy underneath, serrated; the middle leafit egg-shaped, the lateral ones with generally two lobes. Linn. Fruit-stalks round, downy, long, with from one to three flowers, sometimes prickly. Fruit composed of fewer and larger granulations, from one to five. Woodw. Blossoms white. Fruit bluish black, ascescent. (Stem prostrate, rod-like, glaucous, radicating. Fl. Brit. E.)

DEWBERRY. (Welsh: Muyarllwyn glás. E.) Woods and hedges, and balks of corn-fields. Mr. Woodward. S. June-July.* (Var. 2. Flore pleno. Double-flowered. In fields near the vicarage at Keswick; also in Borrowdale. Mr. Winch. E.)

(R. CORYLIFOLIUS. Leafits generally five, hairy beneath; the lateral ones sessile; prickles straightish; calyx reflexed. E. Bot.

E. Bot. 827-Schmid. Ic. 2. E.)

Dillenius in R. Syn. 467, seems to have been clear that there were two sorts of Great Bramble; but he has not well ascertained their differences. (These have been more recently discriminated by Mr. Crowe, in E. Bot., where the plant is described as having a "stem roundish, biennial, not truly shrubby or perennial, much more brittle, so that it is rejected by thatchers who use the other for binding thatch; all the prickles nearly straight, not hooked. Leafits large, always green on both sides, never white beneath, sometimes very exactly resembling the leaves of a hazel; the lateral ones sessile. Fruit earlier, of a browner black, more gratefully acid than in R. fruticosus, and composed of rather fewer grains." Notwithstanding this attempt to establish a species, we cannot but greatly doubt these characteristics proving invariable. Mr. Anderson, in Linn. Tr. vol. xi. says the only steady scientific mark of distinction is that of the shoots of R. fruticosus being constantly placed on the ridge of the angle or furrow of the stem; whereas those of R. corylifolius, besides being more slender, more numerous, and of irregular size, are indiscriminately scattered all over the shoot, which is generally round, rarely angled, and more spongy and brittle than in fruticosus. Smith adds, the glands on the calyx and flower-stalks also distinguish this plant. E.)

(Var. 3. R. suberectus. Anderson. Fruit dark red, not purple.

Linn. Tr. xi. t. 16-E. Bot. 2572.

The habit approaches nearest to that of R. corylifolius, with which it is frequently intermixed. It differs in being more upright in its branches; in the leaves having often seven leaflets, (never the case with corylifolius or fruticosus,) which are generally more acuminated, and smoother on the upper surface, the undermost and uppermost pair sessile; in the aculei being more rare and shorter, and in the fruit being dark red, not dark

when in flower the foot-stalks are sometimes eaten through by the minute Dermestes tomentosus; and bees frequently anticipate us by sucking the fruit with their probosces. E.) *(Gathered by poor people as an agreeable sub-acid fruit. E.)

purple. The whole plant has a darker hue than that of R. corylifolius. Anderson. in Linn. Tr. xi. R. Nessensis. Hall. Tr. R. Soc. Edin. iii. Not of rare occurrence, growing chiefly among loose stones, by way sides, or at the foot of rocks in upland exposed situations. Anderson. E.) HAZEL-LEAVED BRAMBLE. (Welsh: Mwyarllwyn cyllddail. E.) R. corylifolius. Anderson in Linn. Tr. v. 11. Sm. Hook. Grev. R. fruticosus major. With. Ed. 3 and 4. Hedges, thickets, and moors, frequent in England, Scotland, and Wales. In Norfolk, generally intermixed with R. fruticosus.

R. FRUTICO'SUS. (Leaves of three to five petiolated leafits, hoary beneath; angles of the stem armed with hooked prickles; segments of the calyx reflexed. E.)

(E. Bot. 115—Fl. Dan. 1163. E.)—Mill. Ill.—Schmid. 2-Blackw. 45. 7— Kniph. 5-Matth. 1009-Dod. 742. 1-Lob. Obs. 619. 1. Ic. ii. 211. 2— Ger. Em. 1272. 1-Park. 1013-Fuchs. 152-Trag. 970—Ger. 1089. 2— J. B. ii. 59. 1-Lonic. i. 41. 1.

Stem angular, purplish, very long, with runners often several times the height of a man in length, spreading and climbing far and wide, and sometimes striking root. Prickles alternate, strong, bowed back. Leaves, the lower five-fingered, the upper three-fingered, and sometimes simple or with two or three lobes. Petals flaccid, white, or purplish. Stems always angular. Prickles always strong and hooked. Leafits usually elliptical, sometimes oval-spear-shaped, serrated, dark green above, white with a close down underneath, sometimes, though rarely, only hairy, and then pale green; the middlemost on a leaf-stalk, the next pair on short leaf-stalks, the lower on shorter leaf-stalks, and sometimes sessile. Woodw. Prickles broad at the base and flatted. Fruit black. (Leaves durable. E.)

Var. 2. (Fructu albo. E.) Fruit white. Bark and leaves of a pleasant green. Hedge near Oxford. Bobart in R. Syn. 467. 2.

COMMON BRAMBLE. BLACKBERRY. (Irish: Driseog. Welsh: Mwyaren ddû. E.) Hedges and woods. (In sequestered denes of the north of England, even at a height of 2,000 feet, this and one or two other hardy species may be observed, where they become all but evergreens. Winch. Geog. Distr. E.) S. June-Sept.

The berries, when ripe, are black, and do not eat amiss with wine; (they are rendered more palatable by being mixed with the juice of sloes. An excellent rob may be prepared from them, particularly grateful as a sub-acid in catarrhs and sore-throats. In dysentery the berries exsiccated in a moderate oven, and afterwards reduced to powder, which may be kept in well-closed bottles, are esteemed an efficacious remedy; as are the roots of another species, according to the practice of the Oneida Indians; it might, therefore, be worth while to attend to the qualities of the roots of our English Bramble. E.) The green twigs are of great use in dying woollens, silk, and mohair, black. Cows and horses eat it. Sheep are not fond of it. Linn. Three horses refused it. Silk-worms will sometimes feed upon the leaves in defect of those of the mulberry. Stokes. (Blackberries are extremely attractive to children, and the gathering of them affords a favourite recreation, when,

"Duly eager of the tempting store,

Adventurous hands the thorny maze explore."

The long and strong briers make the best standards for boys' kites ; and, in times of better feeling, when the disgusting traffic of the body-snatcher was an unbeard-of enormity, were considered a sufficient security for binding the sod over rustic graves; from which even to have gathered a flower, planted by the band of affection, would have been deemed a profana

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