1882.1 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



376 



season. He said he had recently observed the 

 migration of the Robin [Turdm migrcdorius) in 

 great numbers during the ten days prior to 

 August Ist, or on the evenings of those days, 

 for the flight was from about sundown to dark. 

 They came from the north-west and were flying 

 south east. Some were but a few hundred feet, 

 but others were so high as to be scarcely visible, 

 which would indicate a long journey. Robins 

 had abounded on his property in Germantown 

 during the past spring and early summer. He 

 might say without exaggeration there were 

 many hundreds of them. On the day of this 

 communication, August 1st, it was rare to meet 

 with one. He considered the disappearance 

 wholly one of food. On his grounds there had 

 been no rain of any consequence for two months. 

 For two weeks past numerous trees and plants 

 had to be kept alive by artificial waterings. 

 Examining the dry earth after the harrow showed 

 no signs of insect life. The cherry crop had 

 been nearly a failure. The usual berried plants, 

 such as Dog-wood, on which they usually fed, 

 were not ripe. There was really little for them 

 to eat — and he had reason to believe that the 

 same conditions prevailed all over northern 

 Pennsylvania. In New Jersey, plants with 

 berries were ripening, as they were also further 

 south, and he concluded that this search for 

 food was in this instance the cause of the early 

 migration. — Proceedings of the Academy of Nat- 

 ural Sciences of Philadelphia. 



Scientific Accuracy. — Considering the im- 

 mense amount of rapid work which has to be 

 done by the American conductors of magazines, 

 it IS not to be wondered at that they make mis 

 takes sometimes. Yet it is well known to those 

 familiar with foreign periodicals that the Ameri- 

 can serials are certainly not behind any of them 

 in accuracy. A correspondent sends us the 

 following, which was noted in our columns a 

 year ago, as a singular mass of error from a 

 London paper, but which seems to be still 

 "going the rounds." 



'•Among the wonders of the ' Wild West ' that 

 have recently been discovered is a vegetable 

 compass. The American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science publishes in its 'Trans- 

 actions ' a report penned by General Abford, of 

 the United States army, and treating of an 

 extraordinary plant growing wild in the States 

 of Oregon and Texas, the leaves of which point 

 due north and south, and are consequently 

 utilized by belated prairie hunters as convenient 

 substitutes for the magnetic needle. Professor 



Gray Meehan, who has examined specimens of 

 this gifted shrub at the request of the a^ssociation, 

 defines it as a dwarf variety of the Osier, named 

 Silphium laciniatum. It is perennial, and attains 

 a maximum height of three feet six inches " 



Our correspondent says : '' This ought to go 

 into the Naturalist as an example of scientific 

 accuracy out of America :" 



Ladies' Traces, or Tresses. — There is no more 

 interesting study than the study of words, and 

 when in connection with floral history the study 

 of words is quite fascinating. 



In the early Anglo-Norman times the word 

 trace is used to signify a cord — and ropes and 

 cords used in ploughing or hauling came to be 

 called traces as such parts of harness now are 

 termed. This we learn from old dictionaries 

 extant. 



It is curious to note how words change their 

 application in time. Hose, in those days was 

 the upper part of the leg of a stocking, and was 

 attached to the body of the breeches. When 

 it was separated the whole stocking in time 

 became hose, and what was hose in the former 

 times, became the leg of the pantaloons. 



So this connection of braided cord with trace 

 became so entirely lost, that when Mr. Curtis 

 wrote the Flora Londoniensis, he could see no 

 meaning to "Ladies' traces" in relation to the 

 pretty wild orchids of that name, and he wrote 

 " the protuberant germina, placed regularly one 

 above another, somewhat resemble plaited hair, 

 whence, perhaps, its name of Ladies' traces, or, 

 if this conjecture be correct. Ladies' tresses." 



Dr. Prior, and other authors have adopted this 

 guess, evidently without thought, using indeed 

 almost the same language, changing merely the 

 term "germina" to ''ovaries," but omitting the 

 words "perhaps," "if," and "conjecture," and Cur- 

 tis is then made " authority" for the word tresses, 

 instead of the original traces. It is much more 

 in accordance with the olden language to guess 

 that " Ladies' traces " may have been white 

 silken cords ; as against plow or horse traces 

 which were of braided hemp or braided leather. 



Tress has rarely if ever been used in England 

 in the sense of " braided hair." Moore, Shelley 

 and other poets, in fact use both words in separate 

 senses in the same sentence. The old French 

 and perhaps the old English used tresse to signify 

 the clasp or cord which kept braided hair 

 together; while trace in France was used precisely 

 as in the old English times. Tress in connection 

 with human hair seems to have been used in only 

 recent times, just as it seems to have been in 



