18G2.] BOTANICAL NOTES, NOTICES^ AND QUERIES. 253 



leafy honours are rapidly departing. Most of the oaks are denuded of 

 their foliage by swanus not of locusts, but by the ravages of these vora- 

 cious little pests, the grandmothers of the pea-green moths which entomo- 

 logists call, as I believe, Tortrix viridaria. 



" All the trees just now, near midsummer, have a midwinter aspect. 

 Every one who walks in the forest is speedily covered with this cater- 

 pillar and its webs, which hang to the branches, and extend from tree to 

 tree, and from the uppermost twigs to the ground. This plague is not 

 confined to the forest, but is spread to the Oak-trees which abound in 

 other ])arts of the country contiguous to the forest. I have formerly seen 

 large portions of the forest infested with these destructive insects, but 

 never so universally as in this season. No part has escaped, and at least 

 there will be a loss of one year's growth of timber. The moths lay their 

 eggs on the very top of the trees, and their larvfB (young) devour the 

 leaves, moving or shifting from one branch to another, and from tree to 

 tree, by the aid of their thread (web), by which they ascend or descend at 

 pleasure. Their activity in winding their thread on their legs by their 

 mouth, is a curious phenomenon." 



Note. In the month of May last, this season, 1862, we observed the 

 same mischievous agency at work in Dulwich Wood, adjoining the Crystal 

 Palace. We, i.e. a friend and myself, were annoyed with these little green 

 caterpillars, and our hats and clothes whitened with their gummy threads. 

 The mischief they had already done was very manifest ; and as their 

 operations probably continued for several weeks longer, the destruction 

 they caused in a large wood was fearful to contemplate. 



Gentiana cruciata. 

 Is anything known of Gentiana cruciata as a British plant ? — for although 

 1 do not find it included in any of our Floras, or recognized at all as a 

 native, yet in Salmon's ' Herball,' pp. 413-14, we read, " No. 4, Gentiana 

 minor cruciata, also G. cruciata, Crosswort, also the lesser Crosswort Gen- 

 tian ;" and at p. 415, " The fourth sort, or the Crosswort Gentian, groweth 

 ill a pasture at the west-end of Little Eayne, in Essex, on the north side 

 of the way leading from Braintree to Much Dunraow, and in the horse- 

 way by the same close." This seems explicit enough, and would war- 

 rant any one, who has the opportunity, to investigate the matter further. 

 The figure on p. 414 is certainly a good representation of G. cruciata, a 

 plant occasionally seen in gardens. W. P. 



Hyoscyamus vulgaris. 

 " A remarkable instance of its strange effects on men's bodies when 

 taken inwardly. — The whole relation was told me by a gentleman who had 

 the misfortune to be one of those who unwillingly (unwittingly) made the 

 experiment on themselves. 'Twasthe llev. Mr. Burdett, Dean of Clonfert, 

 who, making some alterations in his garden belonging to his house at 

 Clonfert, in the province of Connaught, about Dec. 1695, as he stood 

 overseeing his workmen digging, observed them to fling up a root in good 

 quantity, which having no leaf he took to be roots of Sisarum vulyare, or 

 >S/i-//Tr/5, a piece of garden-ware whose taste at least is well known, being 

 very delightful and pleasing to the palates of many ; of these roots he 



