THE way-faring tree is a native of most countries of Europe, those only excepted which are situated far to the north. It is found chiefly on a limestone soil in woods and hedges, but is said to delight most of all in

the vicinity of roads. It puts forth its many-flowered cymes, in scent resembling the hawthorn, towards the middle of May, and perfects its berries in autumn, which in an immature state are red on the outside and yellow on the other, but which when fully ripe are quite black.

This tree belongs to a genus containing many species, of which the favourite little winter-flowering shrub laurustinus is one, and the well-known elder another. A very elegant variety may be met with in almost every ornamental plantation. Who is not familiar with the garden guelder-rose, or snowball, which when in bloom harmonises so well with all the gayer shrubs of spring? How beautifully descriptive of its general appearance and mode of growth are these lines by Cowper, where, however, he groups it with more sombre associates; for he speaks of it, as

It has also been sketched by the elegant pen of Miss

Landon :

"Here the guelder rose shall fling

Silver treasures to the spring."

But to return to our homely subject.

The way-faring tree is partly indebted to its name for popularity; not but that its pretty fragrant flowers might justly entitle it to regard; but many a flowering shrub as pretty and as fragrant we pass without notice, whilst this always obtains a share of observation.

Who gave it this appellation, and wherefore, is left to poetical conjecture; but whatever may have suggested the trivial names of this, and other plants, we are indebted to them for many a pleasant and it may be improving reflection. They supply a text on which the mind delights to make its own comments; and there is scarcely an affection or feeling of which the heart is conscious, that may not be in some degree called into exercise by an acquaintance with the habits, properties, and names of the various productions of the vegetable kingdom.

Hail! sportive Fancy, visionary Power,
Oh! soothly tell me in what favour'd hour
Thou first didst visit earth?

Didst thou descend upon the earliest ra
Whose magic chased chaotic gloom away,

And smiled on Nature's birth?

Say, wert thou cradled in the first fair rose
That did in Paradise its sweets disclose,

And with superior loveliness arose

To reign the queen of flow'rs?

And wert thou rock'd by each soft gale, whose wing Caught the rich scent that new-born rose did fling O'er Eden's blissful bowers?

Or didst thou spring in after years

From that fair bow which spann'd the skies,
When Phoebus, pitying Nature's tears,

First gemm'd the falling drops with dyes
So bright, so fair, that of her grief beguiled

She gazed upon the vision-gazed and smiled.

Whate'er thy origin may be,

Sweet Fancy, thou art dear to me;
And whether in the sunny glade

I stray, or pierce the forest-shade;
Whether I tread the moorlands wide,
Or track the brooklet's silver tide,
Or "sometimes wander not unseen
By hedgerow elms, or hillocks green;"
Still be thou nigh, companion dear,
Breathing thy lessons in my ear,

Until I feel, and hear, and see
Sweet, visionary Power, like thee.
For thou canst suit thy varying lore
To shelter'd cot, or lonely shore,
To river broad, or tiny rill,

To cultured vale, or barren hill.
There's not a flower can ope its eye
To greet us as we wander by,

Or dewdrop gem the bloomy spray,
Or Zephyr with that dewdrop play,
But, if thy magic thou dispense,
'Tis gifted with intelligence.
Sometimes by virtue of a name
Thou givest to lifeless things a claim
On man's regard; from its fair bower
How sweetly pleads yon little flower,
"Forget-me-not; "- while further on
The speedwell breathes its benison.
And here's a fair and fragrant tree,
Which from its name might seem to be

- and so it

The wanderer's friend;
For when with weary step he roves,

It greets him on his toilsome way

proves;

With flowers which yield the breath of May,