1781; 



NORFOLK. 



About twenty years ago, it feems, the whole 13. 



countrv was ftripped by this means ; the firft TURNEP 



1 * CATEKP. 

 fowings being deftroyed throughout the county. 



AUGUST 3. It has long been confidered 

 as one of the firft of vulgar errors among 

 hufbandmen, that the berbery-plant has a per- 

 nicious quality (or rather a myfterious power) 

 of blighting the wheat which grows near it. 



This idea, whether it be erroneous or found- 

 ed on facl, is no where more flrongly rooted 

 than among the Norfolk farmers ; one of 

 whom mentioning with a ferious countenance 

 an inftance of this malady, I very falhionably 

 laughed at him. He, however, ftoo'd firm, 

 and periifted in his being in the right ; inti- 

 mating, that fo far from being led from the 

 caufe to the effedr, he was, in the reverie, led 

 from the efTedt to the caufe : for obferving a 

 ftripe of blafted wheat acrofs his clofe, he 

 traced it back to the hedge, thinking there to 

 have found the enemy j but being difappoint- 

 ed, he crofled the lane into a garden on the 

 oppofite fide of it, where he found a large ber- 

 bery-bufli in the direction in which he had 

 looked for it. The mifchief, according to his 

 C 2 de- 



BERBERY. 



WHEAT. 



