AUGUST 185 



been stripped of every leaf, presumably by the Tortrix 

 caterpillar, which so often disfigures the oak woods of 

 the south. The caterpillars have disappeared, so I 

 have not been able to identify them ; but they were 

 probably the larvae of that evil little Tortrix, one of 

 the same genus as the cloth moth, well known to 

 care-worn housewives. Black stand the birches, as 

 leafless as in midwinter, scathed as if by a fire. They 

 have not the recuperative power of the oak, which 

 repairs the damage by putting out a second crop of 

 leaves. 



These birches are of the variety or sub-series known 

 as pubescens, which occupies wetter, colder land than 

 the other kind, verrucosa. This last prefers dry land, 

 and is nowhere to be seen in greater beauty than in 

 Strathspey. It is the weeping birch of our pleasure- 

 grounds, and appears to have quite escaped the 

 attention of Tortrix. Where ornament is the object, 

 the planter should be careful to secure the birch of 

 Strathspey, known botanically as Betula alba verru- 

 cosa. 



XLV 



They do greatly err who suppose that the fascination 

 of angling is derived only from the prospect -j^g 

 of a miraculous draught. It is quite true Nameless 

 that there is always floating in the fisher- 

 man's imagination the possibility of rivalling the pro- 

 digious success of Mr. A. M. Naylor who, on 28th 

 August (I forget the year, but it was somewhere in the 

 'eighties), killed with fly in the Grimersta, Island of 



