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FRUITS IN THEIR SEASON. 263
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Viii. Oi/D Goosebeery A^D His Cuirakt Ee...
marked characters which can hardly be regarded with indifference . It is a significant facttoo , that it usually fetches a higher price in
, the London market than currants of any other color . In Scotland it is yet more esteemed than with us , and the jelly is considered
there to give an additional charm to whisky and -water , as lemon is added to their grog by south Britons . In the north of Russia
where it grows wild abundantly , the love for it is shared by even , the bearswho devour it greedily , large quantities being also
, gathered by the inhabitants , and dried in the sun or in ovens to preserve it for winter _iise , either in tarts or medicinally . On
reaching the utmost extremity of its Pole-pointing tendency in Siberia , it supplies drink as well as food , the berries being fermented with
honey , and a powerful spirit distilled from them , while the leaves form a principal ingredient in the beverage known by the name of .
quass , and are also put into white spirit to give it a brown brandy tint . The efficacy of black currant jam or jelly in affections of the
throat is almost universally known and taken advantage of , though its virtues are in England too often greatly diminished by the use
of more sugar than is fitting in making the preserve . The leaves of the black currant , when dried , are sometimes used in England
and Scotland instead of green tea , two or three of them imparting an additional zest to the ordinary Souchong scarcely to be
distinguished , as some say , from real Hyson , and only needing a Celestial name to be esteemed equal to any import from the Flowery Land .
It is in the transparent yellow dots at the back of the leaves that the strong and peculiar odour of the plant resides . The flowers
vary very slightly from those of the red species , being greenishyellow in color , sometimes tipped with red , and closely resembling
information those of the gooseberry , but grouped in greater numbers into racemes . One of its varieties , toofurnishes that brightest
orna-, ment of early Spring , the Ribes Sanguinum , which , though only introduced here from the north-west coast of America in 1826 , is now
seen almost everywhere , drooping its elegant clusters of rosy blossoms , varying from pale pink to deep red among its leaves of vivid green
, long before the pale tints of our forefathers' lilacs and laburnums have unfolded their more delicate beauties . The seeds grow freely in
this country , producing new varieties , but in all of them it is the flower alone for which they are valued , all the resources of the plant
seeming to be expended in decorating itself with these showy blossomsfor the fruit which succeeds them is an insipid
bluish-, black berry , more similar to a bilberry than either to a currant or a gooseberry , and as a fruit quite worthless . Having thus glanced
at its kindred , whether among useful or ornamental plants , we turn _, once more to the * head of the ribes familythe gooseberry , our own , our
, native plant , for we may call it so on double grounds , being not only indigenous to our islandbutin its best estateat leastalmost
, , , , peculiar to it . It is true that it is a native of other countries ; the
picturesque Vierlander offers it to her Hamburg customers ; its bushes
Fruits In Their Season. 263
FRUITS IN THEIR SEASON . 263
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), June 1, 1861, page 263, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01061861/page/47/
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