No. 11. 



The Osage Orange. — A NiU for the Curious. 



335 



placed with the wood uppermost, which re- 

 mains ever after beyond the reach of a damp 

 from beneath. For such a description of 

 ground flooring- no joists are requisite. The 

 blocks may be made of any length or breadth 

 most convenient; but I prefer making them 

 of about four feet in length, by two feet six 

 inches in breadth. When a very strong 

 flooring of this kind is wanted, I cross the 

 layer of wooden pieces before described with 

 a second of exactly the same description, but 

 laid the reverse way, and upon an interposed 

 bed of one or the other of the four compounds 

 before mentioned. The two layers are then 

 pressed together; and when the compound 

 which unites them has cooled and set, I pour 

 over the whole another coating of the same 

 compound, so as to cover completely the se- 

 cond layer of wood. Instead of the blocks 

 being all of one sort of wood, or of one co- 

 lour, they may be of different wood and dif- 

 ferent colours, so as to give the flooring a 

 tassellated appearance. — Journal of Agri- 

 culture and Science. 



The Osage Orange for Hedges. 



The Osage Orange, known also by the 

 names of "Osage Apple," and "Bow-wood," 

 is indigenous to Arkansas, Texas, and Upper 

 Missouri, and may be safely cultivated for 

 hedges or ornaments, wherever the Isabella 

 grape vine will thrive and mature its fruit 

 in open air. In its natural habitat, the Os- 

 age Orange forms a beautiful deciduous- 

 leaved tree, often growing to a height of 2-5 

 to 30 feet, with a trunk from 12 to 18 inches 

 in diameter; and in very favourable situa- 

 tions it sometimes attains double these di- 

 mensions. The general appearance of this 

 tree greatly resembles the common orange; 

 and when we view the beauty and splendor 

 of its dark, shining foliage, large golden 

 fruit, and the numerous sharp spines which 

 the branches present, we are strongly im- 

 pressed by the comparison. The juice of 

 the young wood, leaves and fruit, consists of 

 a milky fluid, of an acrid or insipid taste, 

 which soon dries on exposure to the air, and 

 contains a considerable proportion of an elas- 

 tic gum. The fruit, however, in open cul- 

 ture does not ripen its seed north of Phila- 

 delphia. 



The most important use to which the 

 Osage Orange can be applied is for the 

 formation of hedges, and there is no plant, 

 in our estimation, better adapted for this pur- 

 pose in any part of the country where this 

 tree will thrive. Apprehensions have been 

 expressed by some that, from its rapid growth, 

 it will soon become too large for live hedges, 

 which, it is thought, will not endure for a 



great length of time. This, however, re- 

 mains yet to be proved. We have no doubt 

 in our own minds, that if a judicious system 

 be pursued in trimming and heading down, 

 they will serve an excellent purpose for 

 twenty years ; for there are hedges of this 

 plant in the vicinity of Cincinnati which are 

 ten years old, and have thus far proved per- 

 fectly hardy, very uniform, neat and hand- 

 some in their appearance, and free from the 

 attacks of insects or disease. 



The Osage Orange may readily be propa- 

 gated by seeds, from which it will grow suf- 

 ficiently large in three years to form a hedge. 

 It succeeds best on land moderately rich, such 

 for instance, as will produce good Indian 

 corn ; but it will grow in almost any soil 

 that is not too moist. The line of ground, 

 intended for a hedge, should first be dug and 

 well pulverised, say from 12 to 15 inches 

 deep, and two feet wide, along the centre of 

 which the plants may be set, at the distance 

 of one foot apart. 



The seeds, before sowing, should be soaked 

 in water, in a warm room, for four or five 

 days; or they may be mixed with equal 

 parts, by measure, of sand, and exposed a 

 few weeks, in open boxes, to wintry weather, 

 on the sunny side of a building, in order to 

 freeze and thaw. It is preferable to sow 

 them early in the spring, in a garden or 

 nursery, where they will shortly germinate 

 and form young plants. These should care- 

 fully be weeded or hoed during the first sea- 

 son's growth, and transplanted in the hedge- 

 line in the month of March or April of the 

 following year. — Exchange paper. 



A Nut for the Curious. — A singular 

 phenomenon occurred this spring at the 

 farm of Martin Mull, Esq., in Falls town- 

 ship. His orchard is composed of the usual 

 varieties. The blossoms on one of the fall 

 pippin trees, which bears excellent fruit, has 

 been peculiarly fatal to nearly all the bees 

 of every description that have visited it — 

 the bumble-bees in an especial manner. The 

 ground is thickly strewed with the dead. 

 The bees, after visiting several blossoms in 

 their usual way, would be apparently at- 

 tacked with vertigo, as if they had taken a 

 deadly narcotic, and descend in spiral circles 

 to the ground. Some would be dead very 

 soon, others would linger a considerable time 

 before they would die; and but few would 

 recover to escape. The tree is now thickly 

 set with young fruit. No other trees in the 

 orchard produced such, or similar effects on 

 the bees, nor was it ever observed before on 

 the tree in question — Doylestoicn DemO' 

 crat. 



