522 Foreign Notices : — Germany. 



is presented to the air, the more benefit will be the result. Others say it 

 forms a constituent to the plant ; and it may also be asked. If the carbonate 

 of ammonia is so near the surface of the ground as to unite with the sulphate 

 of lime spread on it, will it not be washed into the ground by the rains, and 

 thus furnish both carbonic acid and ammonia to the plant ? Whatever may 

 be the result of theories, the sulphate of lime is not a volatile substance, and 

 should be spread as thin as possible on the ground j the more extent of 

 surface, the more action should take place. 



Ravages of Worms at the Roots of Corn. I am of opinion the subject 

 has not been properly investigated. In the Ayr Advertiser it was stated, 

 about two years ago, by an intelligent agriculturist, that more of the damage 

 done was owing to the state of the ground than to worms; and I am of 

 opinion there is much truth in this statement. It is necessary the ground 

 should be porous, that water may not stagnate, and that the confined air and 

 heat may be retained in the pores ; but, if the fissures are larger, the air will 

 not be confined, and the water and gases retained by the capillary attraction 

 and absorption of the small particles will vanish into the atmosphere, and the 

 roots, finding no nourishment, will perish. This state of the ground may be 

 brought about by want of pulverisation. Clayey stiff land, perhaps, worked in 

 wet weather, will leave hollow places in the soil below the surface ; and, 

 though the roots thrive for a time till they have penetrated to these while 

 showery weather continues, they may ultimately, when drought comes on, 

 cause failures, more or less, according to their extent. Wet lands, ploughed 

 early, may be heaved by frost ; and some grey heathy soils are naturally too 

 spongy. All these causes may have an effect, and the benefits of rolling may 

 arise more from the consolidating of the ground than from the crushing of the 

 insects ; which, as they are embedded in the soil, may not take place to the 

 extent anticipated. The wire worm so much talked of, a long yellow many- 

 footed worm with a brown head, and the millepedes, long lead-coloured 

 worms generally called wireworms, we have never seen destroy anything but 

 solid roots ; fibres, as of corn, we should think they do not meddle with. 

 The grub, or cut-worm, a long short thick worm, of a dirty green and brown 

 colour, the larva of the Tipula, or crane fly (jenny nettles, and daddy long-legs, 

 are amongst its provincial names), does us most harm in the nursery way ; 

 but it eats the plants at the surface of the ground, and I have not observed 

 its ravages on the roots. We have had the roots cut of seedling beech by a 

 bright yellow annul ose insect, the larva, I think, of some beetle,* and such 

 as these, and the grub also, may produce ravages at times, and may, in turf, 

 when they cannot get to the surface, cut the fibres and not the stem ; but the 

 thing, 1 imagine, wants confirmation ; and more harm is laid to the score of 

 these insects than, perhaps, they deserve. — R. L. 



Art. II. Foreign Notices. 

 GERMANY. 



Culture of Hepatica triloba. — At the fifty-third meeting of the Society, in 

 Berlin, for promoting the Art of Gardening, on May 6. 1827, the director read 

 a paper from M. Lucanus, apothecary at Halberstadt, on the cultivation of 

 the Hepatica triloba (Jnemone Hepatica) ; which, on account of the beauty 

 of its foliage, and rich display of flowers in the end of March and beginning of 

 April, is peculiarly suitable for edgings round beds, and also forms a striking 

 contrast round grass-plots. 



M. Lucanus is originally indebted for his collection to the woods, and by 

 cultivation and sowing the seed he has produced about fifty or sixty varieties; 

 which, from the size of the flowers, some double and others semi-double, far 

 exceed in beauty those in a wild state. The colours are: blues of different 

 kinds ; indigo blue with white and red anthers, king's blue, medium blue to 



