Dec. 1, 1870.J 



HARDWICKE'S SC I EN CE-GO SSIP. 



281 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



Eccremocarpus. — Any of your correspondents 

 growing in their gardens that pretty but much 

 neglected creeper Eccremocarpus scaler, will find 

 that the bees gnaw a circular hole in the nectary, 

 the contracted mouth of the long tube prevent- 

 ing their entry, and so rifle it of its sweets. This 

 was noticed and commented on soon after the 

 introduction of the plant, now nearly fifty years 

 since. Paxton's Dictionary gives the year 1824 for 

 its appearance in England. — /. 31. E. Daniel. 



Lime Deposit in Boilers. — Could any of your 

 correspondents give me any information as to 

 whether water, in - which potatoes have been boiled, 

 would be of any avail in removing from a boiler the 

 deposit left by water impregnated with lime ; or if 

 any solution would help to remove it ? — E. J. J. 



The Woodpecker. — A correspondent suggests 

 that our provincial word yaffel applied to the 

 Woodpecker, may be from the German wordFordice, 

 given in Fliigel as Wiirfel. I would suggest that 

 it is a form of the common word yapp, " a snappish 

 bark." Mr. Halliwell gives "yaff," to lark, so 

 that the yaffel is the bird that barks ; the bark 

 being the sound dignified as " laughing in the sun ;" 

 a harsh laugh in fact. — A. H. 



Climate Products _ of _ California.— I read 

 under the above heading in Science-Gossip for 

 November, page 160, a short extract from the 

 Gardener's Chronicle, in which these words occur : 

 "Apples do not do well here." Does this passage 

 refer, as the heading would lead one to infer, to the 

 whole State of California, or to some particular 

 country, where tbe writer was located when he 

 wrote it ? I ask, because it is so much at variance 

 with notes given me by a friend of mine, who was 

 out in California for several years, and who spent 

 a considerable portion of his time in travelling 

 through the country for the especial purpose of 

 inquiring into its agricultural and botanical re- 

 sources. I have been looking over some of Mr. G. 

 M.'s old note-books and a few reports published at 

 Sacramento during his stay in the country. Perhaps 

 it may interest the readers of Science-Gossip to 

 see a few extracts. Apropos of apples I find, al- 

 luding to a fair, or exhibition which he attended in 

 Marysville, nearly ten years ago, that he says, 

 " The apples, all standard varieties, were large and 

 fine. This and their freedom from any imperfec- 

 tion is a charming feature in Californian fruits." 

 In another letter, when describing the region of the 

 "Foot Hills," of the Sierra Nevada, he writes, 

 "The soil and air here are peculiarly favourable 

 to the cultivation of apple-trees, the fruit is very 

 fine, far superior to that in the valley-land orchards." 

 Again, giving me an account of a visit he paid a 

 friend of his who had an estate called Laurel Wood 

 Earm, on the west bank of the Guadaloupe River, 

 he mentions one orchard containing sixteen thou- 

 sand apple-trees. Surely people would not cultivate 

 so extensively a tree that did "not do very well." 

 The Evergreen hedges of California must be so 

 attractive to English eyes when they first go over, and 

 the native shrubs are magnificently beautiful. 

 The Nutmeg-tree, so called because it bears a fruit 

 like a nutmeg in shape ; the Madeona, with pale 

 red berries, and satin-like leaves ; the Sugar Pine, 

 the Yew, and the Spruce, are all fine trees. Then 

 there are so many brilliantly-coloured flowers, many 

 of them quite unknown to us in this country. 



Others, which having been lately introduced, are 

 still most rare here, all growing in wild luxuriance 

 over there. I could fill some dozen pages with a 

 description of the beautiful birds and fragrant 

 blossoms of that 



" Bright land of summery clays and golden peace, 

 Of vine and flower, and ever rich increase ; " 



Only as Science-Gossip is not entirely devoted to 

 either ornithology or horticulture, my effusions 

 would, even if the kindness of the editor gave them 

 entrance, seem out of place in such a magazine. — 

 Helen E. Watney. 



Touchen-Leaves, p. 2G2.— In answer to Mr. 

 Lees, I make the following short extract from Mr. 

 Wise's "New Forest:"—" The Tutsan {Androsce- 

 mum) is so common round ] Wootton that it is 

 known to all the children as ' touchen-leaves,' 

 evidently only a corruption of its name ; and its 

 berries are believed throughout the forest to be 

 stained with the blood of the Danes." (I may here 

 state that Wootton is a village in the south-eastern 

 part of the forest, not far from the inclosure of the 

 same name. — 67. B. C. 



Does the Squirrel suck Birds' Eggs ? — 

 I have often heard it will do so, but on no occasion 

 has the statement made me a believer in the story. 

 During the past summer a person brought me a 

 squirrel, and at the same time accused the creature 

 of egg-sucking, but on close inquiry it seemed he 

 had never seen them do so. A gamekeeper also 

 assured me that the squirrel destroyed the eggs of 

 the pheasant and partridge. I cannot, however, 

 believe that the squirrel leaves the trees, where its 

 natural food abounds, to search amongst the dead 

 leaves and herbage for an egg diet. Often have I 

 watched these lively and well-known little animals, 

 but never observed them to touch eggs either in 

 the trees or on the ground. Has any reader of 

 Science-Gossip ever noticed anything of the sort ? 

 as it is a serious accusation to be brought against 

 such an universal favourite ; but as far as I can learn, 

 the case is far from " proven." 



The Cuckoo. — I saw a specimen of this summer- 

 loving bird on September 28th or 29th, evidently a 

 young oue ; and last season I had a young one 

 brought me — about the same date — which had been 

 picked up dead. It is strange that most of the 

 specimens of migrating species of birds which we 

 see very late in the autumn are young ones, or at 

 least birds of the year, and this fact has in one or 

 two instances been given as motives of non-mi- 

 gration ; but it is a conclusive proof that these late 

 birds were unable to accompany their older and 

 stronger relations to a more southern clime, and 

 consequently proves the power of the migrating 

 instinct, rather than being a proof that the species 

 remain with us- the winter through. I am well 

 aware that the unequalled Gilbert White believed 

 in a partial migration, especially of his favourite 

 Hirundincs ; but in many cases, if not in all, I be- 

 lieve the severity of our winter kills those birds 

 which are unable to quit our shores with the main 

 body of migrants. In one of my entomological 

 rambles last summer, I met a person who, knowing 

 my love for the feathered tribe, asked me if I knew 

 the history of the cuckoo, and what a cruel bird it 

 was ? and he gave me an anecdote, illustrating it, 

 as follows — " An old cuckoo laid an egg in a wag- 

 tail's nest, which with the wagtail's eggs was duly 

 hatched ; the young cuckoo soon grew so large that 

 it was obliged to turn out the proper inmates of 



