t^B Mr. WiWhm P'la OH the 



to give, ill their presentments to the quarter sessions, a list of all persons who suf- 

 fered the above plants to run to seeds in their hedges or lands, such presentments 

 to be particularly specified to the court ; those referring to the coltsfoot to be given 

 in at the Lady-day sessions; and those referring to thistles of all kinds, sowthistles, 

 groundsel, including ragwort and other Senecids, and knapweeds, to be given in 

 at the Midsummer sessions ; an order of court might be made for the removal of 

 such nuisances within one month, and a view appointed at the expiration of that 

 time by two of the neighbouring justices, who should be empowered to fine the 

 offenders not complying with such order, in any sum not exceeding five pounds, to 

 be applied to the relief of the poor of the parish where such offence existed. If the 

 present laws respecting nuisances do not give sufficient power for the above to the 

 magistrates, I think a special act for that purpose is not beneath the notice of our 

 Legislature. 



The above proposed regulations generally adopted and applied in practice, it is 

 presumed, may render the British empire as free from noxious weeds as those of 

 China and Japan; particularly if united with the several precautions before proposed 

 for preventing or exterminating these intruders: and it is hoped this public notice 

 of an evil from a public body mav tend to draw the attention of farmers and land 

 occupiers more decidedly to this subject, as it is much more desirable to excite a 

 voluntary spirit of national industry, than to enforce it by coercive measures, though 

 I believe in the instance here alluded to litde coercion would be necessary; as the 

 extirpation of the weeds here specified would be unanimously agreed upon when- 

 ever the subject came under the cognizance of the public eye, and the interference 

 of the police, by publicly exposing such as neglected their duty in this particular 

 might probably be productive of a good effect. 



in. JVeeds in Grass Land. 



As it is not exactly agreed, even by attentive observers, what may be deemed 

 useful plants, and what injurious ones, in the herbage of our meadows and pastures, 

 the writer hereof has first given a list of what he believes noxious plants in grass 

 land ; and has afterwards added a list of what he calls neutral plants, with a few ob- 

 servations on them, in hopes of inducing a fuller investigation of this subject; in 

 which it may perhaps be found, that some of this last class are useful herbage, and 

 others noxious, though their particular qualities are not yet fully discovered. The 



