General Notices. 



219 



be obtained ; also, if you think it will answer for the purpose intended. — 

 W. H. L. March, 1830. 



Excellent Mouse-traj^. — Sir, In return for many useful hints which I 

 have received from your Magazine, I am desirous to contribute one : a de- 

 scription of a simple yet very effective mouse-trap, of which I hope I am 

 the inventor : — Take a circular piece of board, about 2 in. in diameter, 

 and a quarter of an inch thick ; a slice off the grasp part of an old spade- 

 handle answers very well. Drive a nail into the periphery of this board, 

 just far enough to hold the nail fast, and tie to the upper part of the nail, 

 with small twine, a bait of toasted cheese. Take, then, a pan or dish, in 

 the bottom of which lay a piece of board or a tile ; and upon this tile or 

 board invert a flower-pot, having first blocked up the hole in its bottom. 

 Fill this flower-pot, and prop it up with the above circular board, turning 

 the baited nail appended to it inside and underneath the pot. This arrange- 

 ment just leaves space sufficient for the mouse to pass in and nibble the 

 cheese ; which act, operating on the naU as a lever, displaces the prop, and, 

 like Samson in the temple of Dagon, brings a house about his ears from 

 which there is no escaping. Kill, then, as you please : I find drowning 

 best. This trap is much superior to the far-famed figure-of-four trap in two 

 respects : while you are setting one of these you may set twenty of mine ; 

 and mine catches the enemy with greater certainty. I am, Sir, yours, &c. 

 — A Countryman. Dec, 22. 1830. 



The Canker. — In my opinion, this disease, of which, in your Enct/clo- 

 pcedia of Gardening, you complain excessively, is produced by the tap root 

 of trees striking down into a bad subsoil. We have found an efficacious 

 preventive in placing a flag stone, 3 in. or 4 in. thick, under each tree. — 

 Juvenis. New Ross, County of Wexford, Jan. 16. 1831. 



Aquarian, or Waterer. — Sir, Permit me to submit to your consideration 

 the model of a little machine (^fig. 33.) which I presented to the Cale- 

 donian Horticultural Society, through 

 their intelligent secretary, Pat. Neill, Esq. 

 I invented the machine several years ago ; 

 indeed, soon after that of my shower-bath, 

 of which it is the principle. The descrip- 

 tive account of the latter, with a plate, 

 was published in 182.5 : it has been found 

 infinitely superior to all the shower-baths 

 in common use, and its beneficial advan- 

 tages much extolled. I gave it to the 

 public, unfettered by a patent, in 1819 ; 

 when it was, in its improved condition, 

 published in the London Journal of Science 

 and the Arts, with a sketch of its structure, 

 taken from the model by Mr. Newton. 

 The present little apparatus is very neat, 

 and, when accurately constructed, acts 

 admirably ; it is well adapted for tender 

 exotics. Its intermission is under the 

 most perfect control; and the shower 

 may be comminuted and gentle ad libitum. 

 It is supplied by immersion in water, when 

 the orifice is open above, and the supply 

 retained by the fall of the lever, the resilience of the air from below being 

 the principle of suspension. The finger alone may be used as a substitute 

 for the lever («) ; and this constitutes the machine in its simplest form. 

 I am. Sir, yours, &c. — J.Murray. May 8. 1830. 



Horticidture for Sportsmen. — Hares are very fond of the Jerusalem arti- 

 choke (Helianthus tuberosus) ; and, as it is a plant of easy culture, any 



