Ai2 Foreign Notices : — India, Australia. 



together to be roofed with mats against the snow, and all around me wear- 

 ing the appearance of desolation. In two or three weeks the ground will put 

 on its white livery, and we shall not behold the face of the earth till the 

 middle of April. Thus gardening is much more difficult with us than in 

 your far happier climate ; for every thing tender here, if not housed, is 

 destroyed during the winter, and, when the sun resumes its vigour, all 

 bursts npon us like thought. 



I have been much struck by a letter published in the Russian papers, by a 

 retired officer residing on his estates, stating that a peasant in his neighbour- 

 hood cured the hydrophobia, but, as always is the case, kept his secret. On 

 getting some of his powders, he found seeds among them which had not been 

 pounded. He sowed them, and produced the Z/Otus ornithopodioides, which, 

 and similar plants gathered in the fields, he dried, when the seeds ripened, 

 in a cool oven, and then pounded all but the root to powder. He adminis- 

 tered a soup-spoonful to man and to the smaller animals, and two to the 

 larger ones. He has cured several of the latter, and one man ; and begs the 

 medical people throughout the empire to give the thing a trial, and let him 

 know the result. It is inconceivable how many excellent remedies the 

 peasantry in this country possess, if they were only known. I have two 

 instances among my own relations. A very clever medical man had exhausted 

 every remedy to cure an inveterate ague without success ; whereas, a peasant 

 removed the complaint immediately. The other was a man-servant, whose 

 arm, on account of a number of sores, the medical men had condemned to 

 be amputated. As he would not consent, a woman took him in hand, and 

 effected a cure, and his arm is as healthy as mine. 



I have not time to go through the remedies against the black insect on 

 cherry trees [? the slimy grub, Tenthredo cerasi] ; but, finding my gardener had 

 neglected them, I got angry, and reflecting that they had moist glutinous jackets, 

 I took handfuls of the dry mould about the trees, dusted them heartily, and 

 they all disappeared. This is an easy way of clearing cherry trees. — JB. C. 



INDIA. 



r The Improvement of the Agriculture and Horticulture of India is now as- 

 siduously attended to by the East India Company, who are inviting botanists 

 and cultivators to send seeds of every description of useful plant to the Com- 

 pany's house in London ; and who, on their part, are distributing an immense 

 number of seeds of all kinds from different parts of the extensive territory 

 under their government. The superintendence of this department is dele- 

 gated to Professor E,oyle ; than whom there is not a more liberal-minded, in- 

 telligent, and active individual connected with the Society's affairs. — Cond. 



AUSTRALIA. 



Castlereagli Street, Sydney, May 4. 1 839. — I rode down to Mr. M'Leay's 

 villa, at Elizabeth Bay (see Vol. XIII. p. 387.), some four or five months ago, 

 and was really never more enchanted with any spot in my life ; certainly I do 

 not remember any place, either in Great Britain or Ireland, with which I was 

 so much taken at first sight. After passing along a dull road, in a rough un- 

 finished state, a turning brings you near the house ; and you look down on 

 the gardens that decline towards the bay, glimpses of which you catch 

 through the trees ; the gardens being relieved by two or three masses of stone- 

 work, one a beautiful bridge, and the others, I conclude, the walls of tanks. 

 You then come upon the house, a square building with a dome. The most 

 striking part of the effect here is a lawn extending before the house, without a 

 shrub or flower, aud terminating in a dwarf stone wall, slightly curved, and 

 with scroll ends, from which there are steps leading into the gardens below. 

 From this lawn you get an extensive view of the harbour, the view being con- 

 fined on each side by the foliage of the trees j and, below, a thousand hues 

 of trees and shrubs seem to tempt you to wander into a garden of delicious 

 shade and coolness. The house was in an unfinished state ; and all behind it 



