PROCEEDINGS OP THE FARMERS' CLUB. Ill 



"We have had a rather cool day — 'thermometer 56*' in shade — and a 

 very strong- southwest wind, with two small showers ; one with a little ■ 

 thunder and lightning. 



•' Being in my pear-orchard, I have noticed what I never saw before. 

 This morning my trees were all growing very thriftily — to-night, the 

 Belle Lucrative, Virgalieu, Bloodgood, and a variety which I obtained in 

 Ohio — a sort of double bearer — have all of them many young leaves, and 

 Bome of the young shoots, black, wilted, and dead. The other varieties 

 •which I have, Bartlett, Swan's Orange, Osband, Summer Tyson, Law- 

 rence, are all right. Let me trouble you and the Farmers' Club to tell us 

 ■what has caused the mischief ; is it the wind, or blight? One tree of the 

 Ohio variety stands by the corner of a corn-house, so that half or more is 

 protected, and on the protected side it is all right, and on the exposed side 

 it is full as much affected as any other, and the southwest side of all the 

 trees is very much worse than the other. My soil is dry gravelly ridge, 

 three miles from the lake shore, and I never had a pear-tree blight unless 

 these prove so. All kinds of fruit promises an abundant yield, and all 

 crops look well." 



Dr. Trimble thought he had seen trees that had been growing very 

 rapidly affected in a similar way, by a cold storm, and soon recover from 

 the efliect. 



Solon Robinson. — Yes ; but this does not appear to be a cold storm, as 

 the temperature is given at 56°, nor was the wind from a cold quarter, nor 

 are the trees affected generally supposed to be tender. The eff(;ct is a 

 phenomenon not easily accounted for. It does not appear to be the ordi- 

 nary " pear blight," for that comes in a different manner, attacking one 

 branch after another, by a slower process. 



Mr. Wm. S. Carpenter. — Blight does not affect trees of a slow growth, 

 but trees that grow very rapid are very subject to it. Trees that produce 

 wood very late in the season and do not ripen, in the spring the sap be- 

 comes chilled or frozen-, as it is called, and the trees probably die. 



A New Fibrous Plant. 



Mr. Solon Robinson read the following interesting extract from a Boston 

 paper : 



"The Hon. Wm. Pryor, President of the Historical Society of. Halifax, 

 has discovered a new fiber for textile fabrics, which has been fibrilized by 

 S. M. Allen, of No. 3 Tremont row, of this city, who pronounces it a good 

 substitute for flax or hemo. It resembles sweet clover more than any 

 other plant of the kind. Mr. Pryor describes the plant as follows : The 

 Melilotus, planted in drills, twelve inches apart, in May, comes above 

 ground in twelve or fifteen days, grows luxuriantly, yielding an enormous 

 crop from one planting for several years. This plant may be cropped at 

 the stage of growth when it is is found to yield a fiber most suitable for 

 the fabric or purpose required. It grows to the height of from four to six 

 feet. For paper stock, the Melilotus may be cut, dried'like hay, and con- 

 verted into pulp, immediately from the field — the fiber and wood, or stalk, 

 being together available for the difibrent varieties of paper. A peculiarity 



