Trees, Shown to the Children

by C. E. Smith

In winter the Lime tree is difficult to recognise, although there is one feature you may notice: its bare stems and twigs are very black against the sky, and many of the branches hang so awkwardly that they look as if they were dead. But go to the park in spring, and at once you will know which is the Lime tree. Every little twig is coloured a delicate shade of olive green tinged with crimson, and bears many small oval buds (3) which are red like rubies. In May these ruby buds burst open, and their crimson coverings fall to the ground, disclosing the pale emerald-green leaf that is tightly folded within. The leaves (2) soon open in the sunshine, and you see that each is shaped like a large pointed heart, and that the two sides of the heart are uneven.

The edge of the leaf is cut into sharp teeth, and all over it a network of fine veins is spread. When the leaf is still young you find tufts of soft, downy hairs on the under-side, and at first each leaf hangs straight down from its stalk as if it had not strength to rise and face the sunlight. But they soon raise themselves, and gradually their pale green colour darkens, though the Lime tree leaf never becomes so dark, nor is it as glossy, as the leaf of the Beech tree.

In September the Lime tree leaves turn pale yellow: rather a colourless yellow, very different from the rich gold and red-brown of the Beech, and they fall with the first touch of frost.

You may sometimes find leaves which are marked with large black, sooty-looking spots. These spots are caused by a tiny insect which has made its home on the leaf.

If you sit beneath the branches of the Lime on a warm summer day you will hear the constant hum of myriads of bees which are buzzing round the tree. They are gathering honey from the Lime tree flowers, whose delicious perfume is scenting the air.

From the spot where next year’s leaf bud will grow there hangs a long stalk; at the end of this stalk there droops a cluster of flowers (4), and at the base of each flower cluster stands a long slender leaf called a bract. This bract looks like a pale yellow wing, and is covered all over with a network of fine veins.

The flowers have five greeny white petals and five pale green sepals. In the centre is a small seed-vessel like a tiny pea, and from it there rises a slender green pillar which ends in five sticky points. Closely surrounding this seed-vessel is a ring of many stamens. Each stamen has a white stalk with an orange-coloured head, and among these stamens lie the drops of sweet juice which attract the bees.

The stamen dust is ripe before the sticky points of the seed-vessel on the same plant are ready for it; but the bees, when they bend down to suck the honey juice, brush against the ripe stamen heads, and their backs become covered with the fine powder. Away they fly to the flowers on another Lime tree, and the powder will probably be rubbed off on one where the seed-vessel is ready to receive it.

When the seed is ripe you see many little downy fruit-balls (5), each hanging from a slender stalk. In warm countries this seed ripens into a small nut which is ground down and made into a kind of chocolate. But it never ripens in England.

In some countries there are large forests of Lime trees, and the air is filled with the busy hum of the bees. The peasants make large holes in the tree trunks, and these holes the bees fill with honeycomb, which the peasants easily remove and sell. This Lime tree honey is much prized for its fine flavour.