EDITOR S TABLE. 



A New Weed. — Our agriculturists should be on the look out for a new candidate for their 

 spite and ill will. It is a native of Peru, and probably Mexico, but begins to be pretty often 

 met with in the neighborhood of large towns. About the Woodlands Cemetery near Phila- 

 delphia, it is tolerably abundant. It is a composite plant, or of the same natural order as the 

 Kag weed, (Ambrosia artimesicefolia) named by Botanists, Galinzogoa parviflora, and is an 

 annual. It seeds when very small, yet grows one or two feet in height, and seems to be quite 

 at home in our climate. The leaves are ovate and very hairy, and the flowers with a yelloAv 

 disk, and five broad, but short white rays. It will reproduce hundreds of plants in a few weeks 

 if left to seed; but fortunately it is annual, and has no other mode of reproduction. Moreover 

 the least frost entirely destroys them for the season. P, 



Hedge Plant. — Mr. Editok: — Now that some attention is being paid to the subject of good 

 hedge plants, I would beg to suggest for trial by those experimenting, a native, which seems to 

 have all the qualities of a good hedge plant, namely: *" Zanthoxylum Americana" (prickly 

 ash.) This plant has quite a shrubby habit and cattle do not browse on it, at least so far as I 

 have observed, nor do I think it throws up any suckers. What do those say who have observed 

 its habits in different localities? G. — Gait, Canada West, August 11, 1855. 



The Usefulness of Birds. — The New Haven Palladium has the following striking 

 article : 



It takes mankind a great while to learn the ways of Providence, and to understand that things 

 are better contrived for him than he can contrive them himself. Of late the people are begin- 

 ning to learn that they have mistaken the character of most of the little birds, and have not 

 understood the object of the Almighty in creating them. They are looked upon as the friends, 

 and very great friends, of those who sow and reap. It has been seen that they live mostly on 

 insects, which are among the worst enemies of the agriculturist, and that, if they take now and 

 then a grain of wheat, they levy but a small tax for the immense services rendei-ed. In this 

 altered state of things Legislatui-es are passing laws for the protection of little birds and in- 

 creasing the penalties to be enforced upon the bird killers. An illustration of the value of 

 some of the winged tribe is now before us in a paragraph from a paper in Binghampton, (New 

 York.) A farmer in that vicinity wished to borrow a gun of a neighbor for the purpose of kill- 

 ing some yellow birds in his fields of wheat eating up the grain. His neighbor declined to loan 

 the gun, for he thought the birds useful. In order, however, to gi'atify his curiosity, he shot 

 one of them, opened its crop, and found in it two hundred weevils and but four grains of wheat; 

 and in these four grains the weevil had burrowed ! This was a most instructive lesson, and 

 worth the life of the poor bird, valuable as it was. This bird is said to resemble the canary 

 and to sing finely. One of our citizens, a careful observer and owner of many farms, called 

 our attention to this paragraph, and wished us to use it as a text for sermonizing, for the 

 benefit of the farmers and others who may look upon little birds as inimical to their interests. 

 He says he has studied this subject as a lover of natural history, as well as a hunter and a 

 farmer, and he knows that there is hardly a bird that flies that is not a friend of the farmer 

 and the gardener. We think the gentleman is riglit, and hope bis suggestions will have their 

 due weight. 



The Caper. — We make the following exiract of a letter from a correspondent of the Patent 

 Ofiice, dated Washita parish, Louisiana, giving a short account of the culture of this product 

 in Louisiana. — Washington Union. 



" Among other valuable plants of Europe which I have attempted to introduce into this 

 State is the caper, (capparis spinosa.) From some roots which I obtained from ^larseilles, I 

 raised two crops of buds (capers) equal to any I had ever seen in Italy. I lost the plant 

 *Sce Nuttal's North American Sylva, vol. 3. 



