RURAL NOTES- PARISH OF KEA. 47 



then casting f ortli his wheat awaited the harvest with confidence. 

 Now it must be borne in mind that rust follows wet seasons, 

 and rather affects low-lying shady enclosures. Indeed, the 

 English Encyclopedia informs us that this blight is "injurious 

 only in wet seasons," and a drier summer than this, (1880) in 

 England generally, has been rarely known ; moreover this 

 corner of the kingdom was especially dry through the summer 

 months, the neighbouring town of Falmouth, I believe, 

 registering more hours of sunshine than any spot in the 

 kingdom save Pembroke, and as already remarked, the field in 

 question stands remarkably high and airy. 



What has been the result ? This is the first week of harvest : 

 the oats are bright— but a more blighted crop of wheat may 

 not be seen — the straw rusted, ruptured, rough and black. 



I walked over and viewed the northern hedge. An im- 

 penetrable thicket of Barberry ! And the farmer is quite assured 

 in his mind whence the enemy came. 



The belief in the evil qualities of the Barberry is time 

 honoured. 



In the old Encyclopedia Britannica it is said '' the Barberry 

 should never be permitted to grow in corn lands, for ears of 

 wheat growing near never fill," and it is added that " its influence 

 extends across a field of 300 or 400 yards." 



In the early editions of Sowerby, published towards the close 

 of the last century, the evil fame of the Barberry is alluded to, 

 and it is remarked, should the charge be true, it is one of the 

 most mysterious operations in the whole field of natural 

 phenomena. 



It is true the Barberry is itself subject to a fungus, JEcidium 

 Berleridis, whose orange-coloured spores afford a striking 

 contrast to the foliage, but of another species is the mildew of the 

 wheat, Puccinia Graminis, which lodges within the structure of 

 the culm, and its sporules have been thought more likely to be 

 carried up from the earth with the current of vegetation, than 

 to be imbibed, as it were, through the epidermis, or cortical 

 pores, from Puccinia spores floating in the atmosj)here, much 

 less from floating spores of the ^cidium Berheridis ; though, 

 some still hold it as probable, that these last may in some 



