Blossom and Fruit It is the festival of apple-blossom, which
more or less coincides with those three saint days (particularly dreaded in Austria and the Balkans) which are celebrated on the roth, 11th and rzth of May. The apple-blossom is the more precious this year as it is scarce. We have enjoyed two consecutive bumper years, a very rare occurrence. One shrewd observer has recorded that, while we enjoy a bumper plum-crop once every five or six years, we have to wait twenty years for a bumper apple-crop: only a very successful setting of the sparse blossom can give us a tolerable yield ; and the absence of frost till after the middle of May would be a godsend. Happily, other blossom is full enough ; and in most districts the leaves came out on the plum-trees in time to protect the blossom. The plum and pear districts have seldom been lovelier.
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