NATURAL 
wax floats on the surface. It is 
then washed, and melted in a bal- 
nea marie. 
I shall conclude this memoir with 
notices relative to the cultivation of 
the myrica pensylvania. M. De- 
shayes, to whom I am indebted for 
the opportunity of making my ex- 
periments, has for several years 
turned his attention to the wax tree 
at Rambouillet.. He writes me as 
follows on this subject. 
“¢ The myrica latifolia (Ayton) 
is perfectly at home here ; the soil, 
which is sandy and blackish loam, 
is exactly adapted to it: we have 
here sixteen produétive wax trees. 
Their height is four, five, and six 
feet. There is one male tree of se- 
ven feet. ‘Ihe berries are abundant 
almost every year; I say almost, 
because in some years there is a fai- 
lure. In general they are very fine 
in the English part of the garden, 
which is allotted to these plauts. 
_ “ Their culture requires no par- 
ticular, attention: the numerous 
shoots from the foot of the large 
trees’ are every year taken off, 
and planted in some other place, at 
the distance of a metre from each 
other.”’ ' 
_ The berries may be sown in 
Spring, in beds, and afterwards 
transplanted ; but this method is 
thelJongest. The myrica will thrive 
every where in a light and rather 
humid soil. How many provinces 
ave there into which this useful 
: branch of agriculture might be in- 
troduced, and where lands almost 
totally waste, might be turned to 
adyantage ! 
What benefits may not agricul- 
ture in general expect from such an 
acquisition, since the myrica has 
HISTORY. $09 
long flourished even in the arid sands 
of Prussia ! 
The French government has al- 
ready given encouragement to this 
branch of industry, by ordering 
plantations of the myrica, At Or- 
leans and at Rambouillet there are 
two shrubberies of wax trees, con~ 
taining above four hundred plants. 
Too much publicity cannot be given 
to circumstances like these; nothing 
is more tardily propagated than use- 
ful plants. A sterile, but pictu- 
resque tree, au agreeable flower, are 
soon adopted by fashion. They 
ornament the parterres of our mo- 
dern Luculluses, and the apartments 
of our Phrynes, whilst the indefati- 
gable friends of agriculture vainly 
attempt to enrich our fields with a 
new grass, or to fill our granaries 
with nourishing vegetable produc- 
tions. 
Description of the Secretary Falcon*, 
from Bingley’s Animal Biography. 
N its external appearance, this 
bird (though, in am artificial 
system, it is with propriety arranged 
immediately after the vultures) re- 
sembles, in some respeéts, both the 
eagle and the crane, two birds much 
unlike each other ; having the head 
of the former, and somewhat the 
form of the body of the latter.— 
When standing creét, it is full three 
feet from the top of the head to the 
ground. The bill is black, sharp, 
and crooked, like that of an eagle. 
The cere is white, and round the 
eyes is a place bare of feathers, and 
of a deep orange colour. The up- 
per eyo-lids are beset with strong 
bristles, like eye-lashes. Its gene- 
ral 
* Synonyms.—Falco Serpentarius, Linn.—Secretaire, Sonnerat.—Secretary Vul- 
ture, Lath—Secretary, Kerr.—Lathan’s Sin, 
Vol. i. tab, 2, 
