462 THE MAGAZINE OF HORTICULTURE. 



that the same species was affected in a similar manner in 

 Great Britain about thirty years before the malady was first 

 observed in New England, in 1842. In this country the 

 young shoots were blighted before the leaves were fully ex- 

 panded, and perished as if they had been nipped by the frost. 

 Every year since that time, they have been similarly blighted, 

 luiless we except the two or three last years. The trees that 

 were not killed seem now to be slowly recovering their 

 vigor. Several theories have been advanced to explain the 

 cause of this malady. The only one that seems plausible is 

 that the tree occasionally puts out its shoots so early in the 

 spring as to expose them to be nipped by the vernal frosts. 

 One fact that favors this supposition is that the buttonwoods 

 south of the latitude of Philadelphia have entirely escaped 

 this infliction. On this ground, however, it is hard to explain 

 why, with the same habit and in the same climate, the trees 

 were never before affected in this manner. 



The whole difficulty may be overcome if we admit the 

 following explanation. Suppose the young shoots to have 

 put forth prematurely, on account of some accidental influ- 

 ence of climate, in the spring of 1842, when the malady was 

 first observed. A severe frost, occurring soon afterwards, 

 may be supposed to have entirely killed the new growth 

 throughout the country. The trees immediately, as was the 

 fact, formed a new crop of buds as in the autumn. But the 

 new shoots coming from these were put out so late in the 

 season that they had not sufficient time to mature and harden 

 their wood before the arrival of winter. These immatured 

 branches were therefore universally winter-killed, as the first 

 shoots were spring-killed. Hence all the trees, on the next 

 spring, were inevitably reduced to the same necessity of 

 waiting for the development of a new crop of buds before 

 they could put forth their new leaves and shoots. The lat- 

 ter not having time to harden their wood, were, in their turn, 

 winter-killed ; and this two-fold accident must have been 

 repeated annually until 1854, filling the tree with tufts of 

 slender and decayed branches. The summer of 1854 was 

 remarkable for its drought, and for the duration of warm 



