334 IMPORTANCE OF REGISTERS 



England till the larch-trees are visibly green ; and 

 that the garden-warbler and wood-warbler make 

 their appearance at the same time that the elm 

 and the oak are bursting into leaf. Indeed, the 

 very name imposed upon some plants and animals 

 is indicative of such sort of coincidences. Thus the 

 flos-cuculi or cuckoo-flower of the older botanists 

 was so called from its opening its flowers about 

 the time of the cuckoo's commencing his call. 

 Again, the wheatear, Ray tell us,* had this name 

 originally given to it by the Sussex people, on 

 account of its resorting to the Downs of that 

 county in such numbers, previous to its depar- 

 ture, just when the corn is ripe for harvest. 



(3.) But, besides the above class of coincidences, 

 there are others which, after several years' obser- 

 vations, may be determined with tolerable cor- 

 rectness ; and which, being once fixed in any given 

 country, may not only be instructive, but useful 

 in an economic point of view. We allude to those 

 which indicate an accordance between particular 

 phenomena and a certain condition of soil, or sea- 

 sonal influence, fit for the varied operations of 

 the gardener and the husbandman. As this is a 

 subject which has been often treated of by former 

 writers, it will not be necessary to dwell long 

 upon it here.-]- We may state, however, the 



* Synops. Meth. Avium, p. 75. 



f See especially Harald Barck's Dissertation " On the Foliation 

 of Trees " (Aman. Acad. torn. iii. p. 363, and Stillingjleet's 

 Tracts, p. 133) ; also the Preface to Stillingfleet's Calendar of 

 Flora. 



