292 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. 



hers of ears which are necessarily left on the ground, and the 

 irregularity of the sheaves. We have been favoured this 

 season ; the protracted fair weather allowing of a general 

 ripening of the com before the severe autumnal night-frosts, 

 which I have known to occur as early as the 12th of 

 August ; killing the grain when yet in " the milk," blight- 

 ing the hopes of the farmer, and causing in many parts of 

 the country distress little short of actual famine. 



C. — We have had some frosts already ; but not of suffi- 

 cient intensity to injure plants, for even the delicate scarlet 

 beans in the garden are not withered. 



F. — I have heard it asserted by an intelligent practical 

 friend, who has passed many years of sagacious observ^ation 

 in this country, that grain may be gradually inured to a 

 severity of cold which would kill it if it were exposed to 

 its violence without any such preparation. For example, if 

 frosts come, light at first, but every night gradually increas- 

 ing in intensity, a heavy frost may be then sustained without 

 any injury; whereas if a frost of the same severity had come 

 suddenly, after mild weather, the grain would have been 

 inevitably killed. I cannot give any personal opinion on 

 the matter, nor am I physiologist enough to debate the proba- 

 bility of such a variation ; his opinion is drawn from observa- 

 tion of facts, not from any theoretical principles. 



C. — I see in the field, among the grain, a slender, climb- 

 ing plant, whose leaves resemble those of buckwheat : the 

 seeds are of the same shape, of a deep shining black, enclosed 

 in a light skin ; the flowers are small, and pale pink. It 

 climbs spirally around the stalks of wheat, and is not un- 

 common. 



F. — It is a wild weed ; a native plant of the same 

 genus as Buckwheat (Polygonum Convolvulus ?). Do you 

 observe that the elms are beginning to put on their yellow 

 autumnal dress ; and that patches of crimson begin to appear 



