248 



APPENDIX. 



[No. XV.B. 



last year. However, knowing that many funny coincidences do happen, I 

 did not at the time think much about it. However, after I had examined 

 their potato-ground, I found that I incurred no great loss by being 

 debarred from obtaining the above-mentioned return, for I found that the 

 disease had visited them with a comparatively lenient hand this year, and 

 that it did not exhibit itself in its most destructive f orm. 



From the imperfect return which the Horticultural Society could 

 afford, and their unwillingness to afford it, I was induced to write to all 

 parts of the country for information, but yet did not obtain as much 

 information as I could desire. 



For this reason I am anxious to procure further information, and 

 particularly beg agriculturists to fill up the return and send it to my 

 residence as early as possible, that further information may be obtained 

 upon this point. 



The late frost has diminished, though it has not killed the vastators, 

 and I have found it all round London this week. It exists in nearly every 

 greenhouse, and is killing the verbenas in many situations. Under these 

 circumstances, every fact connected with it should be recorded, and there- 

 fore I beg agriculturists to transmit to me accounts of the nights of 

 aphides last year, the present state of the aphides, as well as the return 

 which I have before mentioned. We have now discovered the cause of the 

 disease, and I trust that we may in future prevent it by destroying the 

 vastators. 



Dec. 24, 1846. 



LETTERS TO A JOURNAL ON THE SAME SUBJECT. 



MR. SMEE ON THE APHIDES VASTATOK. 



SIB, If the late Government commission have recommended the 

 abandonment of the culture of potatoes, it is most unpardonable, but at 

 the present time I have neither leisure nor inclination to wade through 

 their reports. They may with equal good reason recommend the farmer 

 to abandon the carrot, beet, spinach, turnip, parsnip, or even the wheat or 

 Indian corn, as I have shown that the vastator attacks all these, and kills 

 whatever it attacks. We know not whether the vastator will recur again 

 in unwonted numbers, or whether it will altogether disappear. Under 

 such circumstances I most emphatically recommend that the crops should 

 be planted as though no disease were apprehended. With regard to 

 potatoes, choose sound sets, plant early, and select early kinds. The late 

 frost has not destroyed the vastators. I found them on Sunday at Totten- 



