VEGETABLES. - 359 



surmount it all : are therefore proper to mend thin places 

 in tall hedges. 



SYCAMORE. 



MAY 12. The sycamore, or great maple, is in bloom, and 

 at this season makes a beautiful appearance, and affords 

 much pabulum for bees, smelling strongly like honey. The 

 foliage of this tree is very fine, and very ornamental to 

 outlets. All the maples have saccharine juices. 



GALLS OF LOMBARDY POPLAR. 



THE stalks and ribs of the leaves of the Lombardy poplar 

 are embossed with large tumours of an oblong shape, which, 

 by incurious observers, have been taken for the fruit of the 

 tree. These galls are full of small insects, some of which are 

 winged, and some not. The parent insect is of the genus 

 of Cynips. Some poplars in the garden are quite loaded 

 with these excrescences. 



CHESTNUT TIMBER. 



JOHN CARPENTER brings home some old chestnut-trees which 

 are very long ; in several places the wood-peckers had begun 

 to bore them. The timber and bark of these trees are so 

 very like oak, as might easily deceive an indifferent ob- 

 server, but the wood is very shaky, and towards the heart 

 cup-shaky (that is to say, apt to separate in round pieces 

 like cups), so that the inward parts are of no use. They 

 were bought for the purpose of cooperage, but must make 

 but ordinary barrels, buckets, &c. Chestnut sells for half 

 the price of oak; but has sometimes been sent into the 

 king's docks, and passed off instead of oak. 



LIME BLOSSOMS. 



DR. CHANDLER tells, that in the south of France, an infusion 

 of the blossoms of the lime-tree (Tilia) is in much esteem 

 as a remedy for coughs, hoarsenesses, fevers, &c., and that 

 at Nismes, he saw an avenue of limes that was quite ravaged 

 and torn in pieces by people greedily gathering the bloom, 

 which they dried and kept for these purposes. 



