64 BOTANICAL NOTEs^ NOTICES, AND QUERIES. [February. 



A Large Pear-tree. (See ' Phytologist,' vol. iv. p. 369.) 



The tree described below, if not larger, is probably more productive ; 

 but we have in stock a notice of a Pear-tree, a genuine English produc- 

 tion, which is probably bigger, certainly more productive, than both. 

 The ' Nymphe,' a provincial journal, gives an account of a Pear-tree at the 

 village of Amphion-vers-la-Kive, near Evian, in Sardinia, which is one of 

 the sights of the neighbourhood. Its trunk is said to be about eleven 

 feet in circumference at the height of a man from the ground, and its alti- 

 tude about sixty feet. Once in three years it bears such an enormous 

 amount of fniit that the branches have to be supported by strong iron 

 supports. The pears are beautiful in appearance, but extremely disagree- 

 able in taste, and are used for making cider, of which, in 1816, they are 

 said to have yielded 1848 litres, or about 400 gallons, which fetched 540f. ; 

 this year the crop gave 2000 litres, but the value of the cider is only half 

 what it was in the former year. It is calcidated that the number of pears 

 the tree produces in a fuU year is about 124,000, and a dinner-party of 150 

 could be easily accommodated under the shelter of its branches. 



Origin of Species. 



We have seen noticed in your journal some startling assertions, taken 

 from the natural history of the ' Vestiges of Creation,' respecting the 

 transfoi-mation of Barley into Wheat ; but I find that some of our ancient 

 waiters tell us of things quite as strange. For instance. Dr. William 

 Bulleyn, in his 'Book of Simples,' written in 1562, fol. 29, says, "Wheate 

 will turn and degenerate out of his kind, and be cha:nged into Darnel : 

 specially in weate [wet] years ; so saith Matthiolus, in Dioscorides, lib. ii. 

 c. 78. I have seen the like in a field named HeUy, in a town called Hels- 

 hoU, in Sufi^olk." S. B. 



Yertical range of Hypericum elodes. 



{From a Correspondent.) 



Please tell me if there be any part of Dartmoor more than a thousand 

 yards high. See ' Cybele,' vol. i. p. 253, in remarks on the range and 

 altitude of Hypericum, elodes. " Mr. Bowman obseiTed it {H. elodes) at 

 one thousand yards of altitude in North Wales, and I think it was seen 

 by myself (the author) rather higher, on Dartmoor, in Devon." W. P. 



[Our correspondent is referred to the 'Phytologist' for October, 1860, 

 where he will see, on the authority of a recent historian of Devon, that 

 the extreme elevation of Dartmoor is 2090 feet, considerably under the 

 altitude where it {H. elodes) was seen by Mr. Bowman in North Wales, 

 and still more under that where the learned author of the ' Cybele ' thought 

 he saw it on Dartmoor, in Devon. In the latter county the plant appears 

 to have been seen in nubibus.'] 



Communications have been received from 

 George Wolsey, with a specimen of Isoetes hystrix ; J. S. Mill ; John 

 Sim ; John Lloyd ; Thomas Moore ; William Pamplin ; Dr. Lawson. 



RECEIVED FOR REVIEW. 



The Kingston (Upper Canada) Baity News. 



