276 SKETCHES OF RUHAL AFFAIRS. 



three ounces of resin in an earthen pipkin, take it 

 from the fire and pour into it three ounces of fish oil ; 

 the ingredients will perfectly unite, and when cold, 

 acquire the consistence of honey. A slight degree of 

 heat will liquefy it, and in this state paint over every 

 node or infected part in your tree, using a common 

 painter's brush. This I prefer doing in Spring, as 

 soon as the hoariness appears. The substance soon 

 sufficiently hardens, and forms a varnish which pre- 

 vents any escape, and stifles the individuals. After 

 the first dressing, should any cottony matter appear 

 round the margin of the varnish, a second application 

 to these parts will, I think, be found to effect a perfect 

 cure." 



Another great enemy to full-grown apple-trees in 

 orchards is mistletoe or misseltoe (viscum album), a para- 

 sitic plant, fixing itself in the bark of several trees, 

 such as the oak, poplar, lime, apple, almond, and olive ; 

 but in this country most commonly seen on apple-trees. 

 This is not the place to describe the veneration paid in 

 former days to the mistletoe of the oak, which was held 

 by the Druids as a sacred plant. We have here simply 

 to notice it as a pest to the orchard, especially in the 

 cider counties, where it is often permitted to become 

 extensively injurious. The seed of this plant being 

 once deposited, by birds or otherwise, on the bark of a 

 tree, a little rootlet issues forth, and swelling out at its 

 extremity, like the mouth-piece of a hunting-horn, it 

 takes fast hold of the bark, and finally extends itself 

 between the inner bark and the soft wood, where the 

 sap is most abundant, sometimes sending up suckers 

 at a distance from the spot where the root entered. 

 Thus the plant derives its whole nourishment from the 

 tree, which is naturally weakened and impoverished 

 thereby ; indeed, when several plants occupy the same 

 branch, the latter generally withers away and dies, the 

 parasites also dying with it. The best cultivators of 

 orchards in the cider districts are very careful to check 



