HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



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the 2nd of February, Candlemas Day. The same 

 liolds good as a custom with regard to private 

 dwellings, superstition in both cases rendering it a 

 fatal presage if any of these sylvan ornaments are 

 retained beyond the period just indicated. If every 

 remnant of Christmas decoration is not cleared out of 

 the church before Candlemas Day, the superstitious 

 believe that there will be a death that year in the 

 family occupying the pew where a leaf or a berry is 

 left. And it is told of an old lady who was so per- 

 suaded of this superstition, that she would not be 

 contented to leave the clearing of her pew to the 

 constituted authorities, but used to send her servant 

 on Candlemas Eve to see that her own seat at any 

 rate was thoroughly freed from danger. There were 

 many curious customs connected with Christmas and 

 the holly which are now almost obsolete. Southey 

 mentions in his " Common-place Book " : on St. 

 Stephen's Day in Wales, everybody is privileged to 

 whip another person's legs with holly, and this is often 

 reciprocally done till the blood streams down. 



Festive carols used to be chanted in bygone days 

 at Christmas, in praise of the evergreens so exten- 

 sively used at this season, and I will conclude this 

 paper with a verse from a Cornish one. In Cornwall, 

 the holly used to be, and perhaps is now, called 

 " Aunt Mary's tree," Aunt being a term of endear- 

 ment in that locality, therefore they call the Virgin 

 "Aunt Mary." 



"Now of all the trees by the king's highway 

 Which do you love the best? 

 O, the one that is green upon Christmas Day, 



The bush with the bleeding breast. 

 Now the holly with her drops of blood for me, 

 For that is our dear Aunt Mary's tree." 



— See Notes and Queries. 



Hampden G. Glasspoole. 

 15 Mall Road, Hammersmith. 



WHEAT MILDEW AND BARBERRY 

 BUSHES 



MR. C. R. PLOWRIGHT, F.L.S., has been ex- 

 perimenting with the fungus of the barberry 

 leaf (said by Professor De Bary to produce wheat 

 mildew), and has given the following result of his ex- 

 periments : — The experiments, which were thirteen in 

 number, were made during the months of June, July, 

 August, and September of the present year. Some 

 176 plants of wheat were employed, of which seventy- 

 eight were inoculated with the barberry fungus, and 

 ninety-eight were not inoculated, but were kept for 

 check plants, to see whether they would produce the 

 mildew fungus without artificial inoculation. Of the 

 inoculated plants 76 per cent, developed the disease 

 in an average of 15 • i days. But of the uninoculated 

 plants no less than 70 per cent, developed it also. 

 One experiment, and one only, of the thirteen seemed 

 to support the theory. This was the second, in 

 which three wheat plants were infected, while three 



were kept as check plants. One inoculated plant, in 

 the course of twenty-three days, developed the 

 disease, while the check plants remained healthy. In 

 the next experiment, however, in which three plants 

 were inoculated and three kept for check plants, only 

 two of the former, at the end of thirty-one days, had 

 iiredo upon them, while all the check plants were 

 affected. In the fifth experiment, in which ten plants 

 were inoculated and a similar number kept for check 

 plants, only half the number of the former had the dis- 

 ease upon them at the end of twenty-five days, while all 

 the latter, except one, had it. In the sixth experiment 

 fourteen plants were employed, half of which were 

 inoculated and the other half not. Of the inoculated 

 plants five only, at the end of twenty-four days, had 

 the disease, while all the uninoculated plants had it. 



In two of the experiments (Nos. 10 and 11) the 

 sample of seed wheat was divided into two portions 

 • — the one I kept in King's Lynn, and inoculated 

 with the barberry fungus spores ; while the other half 

 was sent to two gentlemen at a distance, namely, the 

 Rev. Canon Du Port, of Mattishall, near East Dere- 

 ham, and Mr. W. Phillips, F.L. S., of Shrewsbury, 

 who grew and kept the check plant. But the result 

 was the same. Both inoculated and check plants 

 were affected with urcdo. 



In the thirteenth experiment, two groups of six 

 plants in each were grown from wheat that had been 

 previously poisoned with sulphate of copper, in 

 ground that was disinfected with diluted carbolic acid, 

 and under two perfectly clean bell glasses, which ex- 

 clude uredo spores that might accidentally be floating 

 in the air. In due course one of these groups of 

 wheat plants was inoculated with the barberry fungus, 

 and the bell glass was replaced and kept over the plants 

 for thirty days, at the end of which time no trace of 

 nredo was found upon either patch of wheat. 



In order to learn how long the spores of the tiredo 

 took to reproduce themselves, in another experiment 

 six healthy wheat plants were inoculated with the 

 spores of the uredo. In eleven days the whole six 

 were simultaneously attacked by the disease. 



The true wheat mildew sometimes, but rarelj', 

 occurs upon the oat, so in another experiment I 

 inoculated a healthy oat plant with the barberry 

 fungus, on the second of August. On the sixteenth, 

 uredo appeared upon it ; on the ninth of September 

 the uredo was abundant upon the leaves of the oat 

 plant, but upon microscopic examination this -uredo 

 was found to be not the uredo of the wheat mildew, but 

 uredo of Puccinia eoronata, a totally distinct species 

 which is affirmed to originate, not from the barberry 

 fungus, but from a similar though distinct species, 

 which occurs upon the buckthorn {Rhavutus frangula). 



In the discussion that followed the paper which was 

 read at Hereford, Mr. A. S. Bicknell related his experi- 

 ence of having seen repeatedly the barberry grown as a 

 hedge plant in Switzerland and Northern Italy during 

 his residence in tliose countries, to such an extent 



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