The rose has long disputed with the lily her claim to rank as Queen of Beauty, nor is the rivalry likely to be decided in favour of either so long as human tastes differ. Howbeit, if the two claimants ever appeal to the arbitrament of war, the rose will have the advantage of big battalions, for her great clan far outnumbers that of the lilies and many of them are formidably armed. There would, indeed, be some mighty blanks in our fields and gardens if the great natural order of Rosaceæ were banned; for not only should we lose the enormous and ever-increasing variety of the rose itself and its hybrids, but the spiræas, the cinquefoils, the cotoneasters, the so-called laurels (which are not laurels at all, but evergreen plums), wherewith we deck our pleasure-grounds, would disappear also, and with them the plums, cherries, peaches, apples, pears, strawberries, and raspberries would be among the exiles, for all these and many more are families in this vast order.
FRUIT OF HAWTHORN (Cratægus oxyacantha)
Yet would not the disappearance of any of them work such a change in British landscape, as it would suffer if we were to lose the hawthorn, which is also a member of the rose order. It is the most beautiful native flowering tree we possess, for the laburnum, the horse chestnut, and the catalpa must be written off as exotics, though, happily, they have proved most successful colonists.
Not long ago I was driving out from New York to visit Mr. Roosevelt in Long Island. My companion and cicerone was one who gained more than the common measure of esteem while he was American Ambassador in London. When I expressed to him warmly my admiration for the masses of Cornus florida which formed the undergrowth of the woods bordering our route, and which (it was in May) were displaying their snowy blossoms in endless drifts and wreaths: "Very beautiful," he said; "but I would rather have your British hawthorn blossom with its fragrance."
This was high testimony from one in whose country Professor Sargent has enumerated no fewer than one hundred and forty-three distinct American species of Cratægus or hawthorn, many of which produce beautiful flowers; but none of those which I have seen are equal to the single species indigenous to the British Isles—Cratægus oxyacantha. In saying a single species, I am aware that later botanists have distinguished as a species a form found on the Continent and in the midland and south-eastern English counties; but Bentham and Hooker admitted this only as a variety.
In Scotland we always speak of hawthorn blossom, but in England you shall never hear that term, for there they call it May blossom, yet you may seldom find it in bloom till near the end of that month. In Brand's Antiquities (1777) it is stated that "it was an old custom in Suffolk in most of the farmhouses that any servant who could bring in a branch of hawthorn in full blossom on the 1st of May was entitled to a dish of cream for breakfast. This custom is now disused, not so much from the reluctance of the masters to give the reward, as from the inability of the servants to find the white thorn in flower." The reason for this is to be sought in a change, not in the flowering season, but in the calendar; the old style during the eighteenth century being twelve days in arrear of the new style, so that May Day was equivalent to what is now 12th May. It will be remembered that, while the new style was enacted in Scotland by James VI.'s Privy Council in 1600, it was not until 1751 that an Act of Parliament caused it to be adopted in England, which did the Suffolk peasants out of all chance of cream for breakfast.
One of the many admirable virtues of the hawthorn is its indifference to soil and situation. Give it light and free air, and it will flower as freely on the shingle of a wind-swept beach, where it crouches along the stones to escape the blast, as it does in a fat English pasture, a villa garden, or a Highland glen. The most remarkable grove of ancient hawthorns known to me is to be seen in the Phœnix Park, Dublin. It is a sight never to be forgotten when these trees, many of them (speaking from recollection) 40 feet high, are laden in June with their snowy wreaths. There are many hawthorns of greater height in other districts, notably one at Lenchford, in Worcestershire, whereof the dimensions in 1875 were recorded in the Gardeners' Chronicle as 60 feet high and 9 feet in girth.
The hawthorn is a long-lived tree. It was not until after the middle of the nineteenth century that Maxwell's Thorn disappeared from the banks of the Dryfe in a flood. It was under this tree that, according to local tradition, John Lord Maxwell, the Warden, lay wounded after the fatal encounter with the Johnstones on Dryfe Sands, 6th December, 1593. Eight hundred of his men are said to have perished, and the old lord, "a tall man," says Spottiswoode (vol. ii. 446), "and heavy in armour, was in the chase overtaken and stricken from his horse." William Johnston of Kirkhill was his assailant; who, according to some accounts, contented himself with hewing off the Warden's hand, in order to claim the reward offered by his chief to any man who should bring it to him. As Maxwell lay bleeding under the thorn tree, a lady came on the scene—some say it was the lady of Lochwood herself, the Chief's wife, others that it was the wife of James Johnston of Kirkton. Whichever it was, she belonged to the militant party of her sex, if it be true, as alleged, that she knocked out the Warden's brains with the tower keys that hung at her girdle. In justice to the dame it should be mentioned that a few nights previously Lord Maxwell had burnt down Lochwood Tower, declaring that "he would give the Lady Johnston light to set her hood!" Moreover, he had offered the gift of a farm to anyone who should bring him the head of the laird of Lochwood, who, being in arms against the Warden, was technically the King's rebel. Maxwell's Thorn, as aforesaid, ceased to exist sixty years ago, but a young tree was planted in its place, which doubtless will be venerated by generations unborn as the original.
The kindly nature of the hawthorn and the simple nature of its cultural requirements have caused everybody to be familiar with the beautiful red and pink, single and double, varieties which have been raised and widely distributed. There is a variety with scarlet berries which I have only seen in the park at Newton Don, near Kelso. Beautiful as are the common red haws upon which fieldfares, redwings, and other winter visitors mainly depend for provender, this scarlet fruited variety is a much more brilliant object at the dullest time of the year. The variety with yellow haws is no improvement on the type.