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In my war on blight I always weigh well the remedies : many a tree 

 has been killed to get rid of its blight : this plan is efficient but impo- 

 litic, energetic but unwise : some will white-wash a gooseberry -bush, 

 the effect of which is cheerful and pleasing to the eye but rather inju- 

 rious to the leaves, and moreover gives an unpleasant flavoui- and a 

 kind of grittiness to the berries : some will water the bushes with 

 strong brine, thereby greatly annoying the grub by killing the leaves : 

 quicklime has a very similar effect. It strikes me that no nostrum will 

 ever be found that shall be perfectly efficient as regards the grub 

 and harmless as regards the tree : it would therefore be my plan 

 to attempt to lessen an evil that is not to be cured. I have already 

 mentioned the good effects of smoke ; the picking of the perforated 

 leaves I have also recommended: another benefit will arise fi'om 

 treading the ground very hard about the roots of the bushes. An ob- 

 servant gardener cannot fail to notice that when goosebeny-bushes 

 stand singly at the end of patches of potatoes, peas or beans, they are 

 sure to be more infested than when in a close bed : the reason for this 

 seems to me that the soil for all our culinaries is made as light as possi- 

 ble ; this is effected by constant digging, hoeing or raking : in a bed fil 

 led with gooseberry-bushes, on the contrary, there is but little moving of 

 the earth going on, and it gets trodden hard when the gooseberries are 

 ripening, and commonly remains so through the year. This hardening 

 of the soil prevents the grubs fi-om burrowing when they come down 

 from the bushes, so they go wandering about and become a prey to the 

 hedge-sparrows, house-sparrows, whitethroats, robins, and other birds 

 that are always on the look-out for them : it also prevents so feeble an 

 insect as the fly from forcing its way upwards from the cell in which 

 it has changed ; thus those on the surface and those under the surface 

 are alike assailed by the simple expedient of hardening the soil. I 

 have tried numberless experiments on the grubs themselves, and find 

 them very easy to kill : brine, tobacco-water, snuff-water, and other 

 mixtures are fatal ; but these remedies, like the once celebrated flea- 

 poison, require the captm^e of the animal in order to their being ad- 

 ministered with effect. 



Believe me very truly yours, 



****** ****. 



To the Editor of the Entomologist. 



