Foreign Notices : — France. 2SJ-9 



bed, and scarcely produce any bulb at all. The same thing takes place with 

 the different species of bulbous /ris when raised from seed, and, to a consider- 

 able extent, with seedh"ng bulbs of every kind. In order to prevent this, and 

 to cause the radicle to exhaust itself in the form of a bulb, instead of in the 

 form of a long slender root, the seeds should be sown in pots or pans, not 

 above 3 in. or 4 in. deep ; or, if in beds, a bed of slates or tiles should be formed 

 Sin. or 4 in. beneath the surface. When this is properly attended to, the 

 bulbs produced by seedlings the first year will be as large as those of three 

 years' growth, where no stop was given to the descent of the roots. This 

 doctrine is very well illustrated by an engraving in Smith's Florisfs Magazine, 

 vol. i. p. 88. 



Art. II. Foreis:n Notices. 



FRANCE. 



The Climate of ATontpelier as compared with that of Toulouse. — M. Raffeneau 

 Delille, director of the Botanic Garden at Montpelier, has published, in the 

 last numbers of the Bulletin de la Soc. d'Agric. de VHerault, some observa- 

 tions which show that the climate of Montpeher is not warmer than that of 

 Toulouse, and that the winters there are more rigorous than in Avignon ; for 

 many plants that endure the open au* in the latter town were frozen at Mont- 

 pelier in 1820, 1830, and 1835. 



M. Delille states that, on Nov. 1 1., a strong north wind began to blow; and 

 that, during the following days, the frost was very severe. On the 14th, snow 

 fell plentifully; and, at midnight on the 16th, the thermometer stood at 11° 

 below zero in Reaumur (7° Fahr.) ; and even the Quercus virens, the arbutus, 

 the cypresses, and the olives, suffered severely. 



Among exotic plants which were in the open air in the Botanic Garden, M. 

 Delille mentions the following, as having totally perished : — Jcacia dealbata, 

 and J.farnesiana, J'loe fruticosa, Capparis spinosa, Cassia coryrabosa, Casuarina 

 equisetifolia (which perished at 20" Fahr.), the orange, the citron, Croton 

 sebifera, several figs (i^icus Carica), Lavater« arborea, young plants of 

 i^/elia Azederdc/i, Opuntia DillenH, Aristoteh'a Jlldcqui, Buddlea ^alvifolia 

 and B. salicifolia, &c. Others have only some of their branches or stalks 

 frozen, and sprang up again from the roots; such as the yicacia heterophylla 

 and A. Julibrissin, j'ster carolinianus, Tecoma capensis and T. grandiflora, 

 Buddlea globosa, Ceratonia (Siliqua, T^icus Dum6nt/«, i7ypericum balearicum, 

 t/asminum revolutum, Melianthus major and M. minor, the common myrtle, 

 the pomegranate, Pyrus nepalensis, /Schinus Molle, Sophora secundifolia, 

 Aloysia citriodora, &c. 



Cereus peruvianus, Titex J'gnus castus, and V. incisa, »S'empervivum arbo- 

 reum, Berberis asiatica. Wistaria Consequana, Pittosporum sinense, and a 

 few other plants, natives of a southern climate, have, on the other hand, stood 

 out. {U Hermes, Jan. 14. 1837.) 



The Formation of Cork. — M. Dutrochet communicated, at the last meeting 

 of the Academy of Sciences, the results of his observations upon the form- 

 ation of cork in various plants. Cork is generally supposed to be produced 

 by a superabundance in the layer of cellular tissue, exterior to the fibrous 

 layers of the bark, as in the Quercus (Suber ; but M. Dutrochet states that, 

 according to his observations, this substance has a different origin. The ex- 

 ternal coating of vegetables is composed of two parts : 1st, the epidermis, or 

 cuticle, an extremely thin membrane, without any discernible organisation ; 

 2dly, of a second membrane, composed of small cells, which was for a long time 

 confounded with the epidermis, but has been very clearly distinguished from 

 it by M. Adolphe Brongniart. This membrane, which M. Dutrochet has de- 

 nominated the tegument or pieau cellulaire, increases in thickness by the pro- 

 duction of new cells upon its interior surface. According to him, it is this 



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