Editor s Box. 271 



purpose Sycamore is used, unless there is a certain amount of friction con- 

 stantly applied to its surfoce, worms are sure to get into it in preference 

 to any other timber. For instance, if a table-top is made of sycamore and 

 covered over with a permanent cover, worms will not be long in making 

 their appearance, and also in the side-rails of tables and bedsteads, or in 

 fact for whatever purpose the wood is used, if it is not exposed to a 

 certain amount of friction, it will sooner or later be destroyed by worms. 



On the other hand, the sycamore wood excels any other for the con- 

 struction of the large rollers that are used in the manufacture of cloth, 

 which makes the wood in this district ; if you can get it sufficiently long, 

 and over 20 inches in the quarter girth, more valuable than any other 

 English-grown timber. For any other description of rollers, sycamore 

 excels all other wood. For the manufacture of kitchen tables or such 

 other articles that would be scoured or washed occasionally, sycamore is 

 suitable, but I cannot agree with that part of the quotation from the book 

 where it reads that sycamore " is not subject to he ivorm eaten."" 



R. Jandrell, 



HawJcstone, Salop. Forester, §x. 



P.S. — If you wish I could send you a report of the conifers that we 

 have here. I believe they are not to be easily excelled in Britain. [Do. Ed.] 



PLANT PATHOLOGY. 



Sir, — The presence of fungi in decaying timber indicates only the effect of 

 the cause, and must not be confounded with the disease. No tree suffers 

 from putrefaction, nor can a nidus for fungi be formed, until its living 

 principle has become neutralized. When such takes place, whether from 

 aridity or internal fermentation, Cryptogamia complete the work of de- 

 struction in the timber. The sap or life-sustaining element of growing trees 

 is a substance of a highly organized nature, containing ingredients ex- 

 tremely susceptible to putrescency. A secretion from any of the con- 

 stituents composing the sap will ferment and generate a sort of virus in 

 the cells, which will soon form a receptacle for fungi. Fungi multiply on 

 the geometrical principle, and a single spore insinuated in the intercellular 

 tissue will, with their productive propensities, generate infinite numbers 

 in a remarkably short space of time. I will sum up the cause of this 

 disease briefly. 1st, the presence in the soil of something inimical to the 

 tree ; 2nd, when soils are deficient of the particular constituent which 

 nourishes the tree ; 3rd, when soils are shallow, and lying on impervious 

 beds of clay, metalliferous ores, or igneous rocks ; 4th, when soils are 

 sour or not sufficiently drained ; 5th, when thinning has been neglected 

 and the pabulum exhausted ; 6th, when the physical character of the 

 plant is bad, by being raised on soil containing a preponderance of organic 

 matter. 



D. Sym Scott. 



Ballinacourte, Tip^wrary, dth July, 1877. 



