88 Works on Gardening and Rural Affairs. 



cury as minutely as some persons have done, seems to be a waste of time 

 or a misapplication of attention. Though the hygrometer may give 

 signs of the moisture in the air, and the ombrometer determine by approx- 

 imation the quantity of rain that falls, yet they afford not the smallest relief 

 when gardens suffer by too much humidity, or are scorched by drought. The 

 electrometer is of as little practical use. Lightning breaks forth, and ceases 

 again, according to the laws beyond mortal control. It has, nevertheless, 

 been remarked that some trees are better conductors of this splitting and 

 igniting element than others. The locust (Robim'a pseud-acacia) is very 

 frequently rent to shivers by it ; while it is affirmed, on credible evidence, 

 that the beech is never the subject of its violence. In some districts of our 

 country, it is customary, I am told, for persons who are abroad during a 

 thunder storm, to place themselves under the protection of this tree. If 

 this, upon further enquiry,* be found to be the fact, it might be a matter of 

 precaution against its visitations to form hedges, coppices, and rows of this 

 non-conducting fagus. 



" I was charmed, a few days ago, with the examination of the young 

 ladies, at one of our respectable schools, on botany. They answered the 

 questions put by their instructress without hesitation, as they seemed to 

 have learned the lessons with pleasure. There is, perhaps, not a more 

 agreeable feature in our social system, than the exertion to inform the 

 female mind. A bouquet in the possession of a belle attracted the notice 

 of an inquisitive swain. She answered his queries by telling the ignorant 

 fashionable the common terms of the flowers, accompanied with the generic 

 and specific names, according to the classification of Linnaeus. The beau 

 was so humiliated and confounded, that he betook himself to the science, 

 the better to qualify him for her company." 



After recommending attention to the destruction of weeds, and the study 

 of the diseases of plants, Dr. Mitchill thus concludes : — 



" Our organization fits us for labour, and experience amply proves the 

 health and recompense that result from due application. Employment, 

 indeed, is essential to happiness, Persevering and diversified industry 

 begets skill ; and by this can rocks be converted to fences, water be 

 changed to land, the barren rendered fertile, wastes wear the aspect of 

 elegance and plenty, and the choice productions of nature be augmented 

 and meliorated ; and, if it be demanded where improvements in horticul- 

 ture shall end, the answer is, that they surpass our present knowledge, and 

 defy the existing rules of calculation !" 



An Appendix contains some notes, of which the following, by Dr. Pascalis 

 President of the Linnaean Society of Paris, appears to us worth quoting : — 



" The process of abstracting electricity from the clouds, by planting 

 poles covered with twisted straw, as mentioned last year, and thereby 

 guarding cultivated fields against the destructive effects of hail storms, has 

 been fully and successfully exemplified in extensive districts of Germany 

 and Italy, in or about the lower Alps and Apennines ; and it is now still 

 further ascertained, that not only metallic, but ligneous or vegetable points, 

 can divert torrents of electricity in different currents ; also, that this 

 element is as necessary to plants as pure air or other gases, because, by 

 their sharp-pointed leaves and thorns, they abstract it from the atmo- 

 sphere. This subject, which so strikingly evinces the wisdom of the Creator, 

 was experimentally demonstrated by a Linnaean member, who has sub- 

 jected electricity to positive and negative evolutions, by means of thorny 

 shrubs, and as easily as Franklin drew it from the clouds with a child's 

 plaything — a flying kite, armed with a metallic point !" 



