172 



Garden and Forest. 



[June 6, 1888. 



Charlecote Hall stands some three miles from Stratford- 

 on-Avon, and was in Shakespeare's time, as it still is toda}'', 

 the seat of the Lucy family ; and it was in Charlecote 

 Park that, as the familiar legend tells us, the young poet 

 played the poacher's part. The hall, as it stands to-day, 

 scarcely changed as regards its exterior, was built in the 

 first year of Queen Elizabeth's reign — in 1558, six years be- 

 fore Shakespeare's birth. As we see it to-day, therefore, 

 he must have seen it ; and not only the Hall itself, but the 

 gate-way and court-yard which our illustration shows, for 

 these form an integral part of the plan of the building it- 

 self. Our point of view is from a spot immediately in 

 front of the Hall, the projecting wings of which are joined 

 by the terrace walls on either hand. Thus house and walls 

 and gate-way completely encircle the court-yard, and the 

 architectural design of the little garden it encloses was 

 dictated by good taste. Imagine this small space arranged 

 in the natural style of gardening, and we perceive at 

 once that the planting itself would be ineffective, and that 

 the effect of the architecture would be grievously impaired. 

 Beyond the walls the naturally growing trees give an ac- 

 cent of variety, and pleasantly suggest the beauties of that 

 wilder nature which the word park implies. But within 

 the walls the formal beds are properly placed, and even 

 if vivid in color they cannot be too emphatic in effect, 

 for they are not set in immediate relief against a carpet of 

 bright green, but are surrounded by borders of gravel 

 the neutral tones of which, together with those of the archi- 

 tectural elements, must subdue the brightest floral notes 

 into a gfeneral harmonv. 



Entomolouical. 



The Work of a Timber Borer. 



AS is well knovi'n, the borers of some of our shade 

 trees, as well as the grub or larva of the Monoham- 

 mus of the White Pine, occur in lumber, and, on very rare 

 occasions, live on for many years, either as larvae or bee- 

 tles, probably the latter, in lumber which has been made 

 into tables, chests of drawers or other articles of household 

 furniture ; the beetle for a long time afterwards giving out 

 ghostly squeaks, finally emerging from its tunnel in the 

 well-worn and familiar bureau or table, as the case may 

 be. The latest occurrence recorded in print is noticed by 

 Mr. y. McNeil, who states in the Atnerican Naluralist for 

 December, 1886, that two specimens of a longicorn beetle 

 {Ebwia qiiadrigeminata) must have lived in an ash door-sill 

 for a period which "would make these insects not less than 

 nineteen, and probably twenty or more years old." A 

 somewhat similar case happened at Salem, Mass., as we 

 have been informed by A. C. Goodell, Esq., who took a 

 "sawyer" beetle {MonoJiai?i??ius coufusor) irom a bureau 

 that had been in his house for fifteen years, and was new 

 when bought. 



Apropos of such cases of extraordinary longevity in 

 boring insects whose life ordinarily spans but two, possi- 

 bly three, years, and which occur in articles of furniture, 

 the Messrs. Goddard Brothers, of Providence, R. I., have 

 called our attention to the damage done to a case of cotton 

 cloth at their Lonsdale Mills, and have kindly presented 

 the three larvae found, together with a damaged bale of 

 cotton cloth, to the Museum of Brown University. 



The box containing the goods was of pine, and per- 

 forated by at least three or four grubs, seventeen pieces 

 being worm-eaten, one of which we have examined. The 

 worms were thoughtful enough to gnaw through the folds, 

 so as to thoroughly riddle almost every thickness of the 

 cloth; the perforations in one case being about three inches 

 long and half an inch wide on the outside, and contracting 

 for two inches within to a size corresponding to that of 

 the body of the grub. Not having seen the box, I quote 

 from a letter to the Messrs. Goddard from Mr. J. Johnston, 

 of Lonsdale, who took some pains to examine the box and 



to identify the worms as larvae of a beetle. ' ' The hole they 

 make is in shape a very elongated oval, and is, I think, in 

 every case about the size of the grub itself. It is unfortu- 

 nate that we did not see the case as it was seen in Phila- 

 delphia. The bottom, where most havoc was wrought on 

 the cloth, was mended with a strip of hard pine; possibly 

 the original board was so badly damaged that it would not 

 have been safe to return the goods in it as it was. On ex- 

 amining the shooks in the box-shop, I find a large propor- 

 tion of them eaten by this embryo beetle. I ought to say 

 that not a single grub can be found in the shooks ; those I 

 send were taken from live wood." 



We are informed that this is the only case of the kind 

 which has occurred out of about 250,000 boxes sent out 

 from the mill. How long the larvse may have lived in the 

 lumber is, of course, difficult to say. 



The larvae, one of which was still alive, were about 

 three-quarters of an inch in length, and on comparing them 

 with the half-grown larvae of Monoliamnius confusor of 

 nearly the same size they were found to differ as follows : 

 the clypeus and labrum are wider, the edge of the protho- 

 racic segment is more hairy ; the body is wider behind the 

 thoracic segments, and more rounded and Vi'ider at the 

 end. Without doubt these larvae differ generically from 

 Monohammus, but in the present state of our knowledge, 

 it is impossible to refer them to their proper genus and 

 species. 



We may here remark that the larvae of Monohammus 

 confusor live two years before transforming into beetles, as 

 we have been able to prove, having been fortunate enough 

 to detect a female in the act of laying its eggs, and the 

 year following to cut its half-grown grubs out of the 

 same tree. 



It is probable that the cases of extraordinary longevity 

 on record are due to the fact that through some cause the 

 insect as a beetle has been prevented from leaving the tun- 

 nel made while a grub. Its larval state may not be pro- 

 longed, but when insects are prevented from mating and 

 la3'ing their eggs, they live on in single blessedness through 

 an unusual number of seasons. There is thus, apparently, 

 a premium awarded by Nature upon celibacy, the reward 

 being length of years. A. S. Packard. 



New or Little Known Plants. 



Camassia Cusickii.* 



THE only American genus representative of the large 

 liliaceous tribe which includes the Hyacinth, the 

 Blue Bell or Grape Hyacinth, the Squill, and the Star of 

 Bethlehem, is the genus Camassia. So near to Scilla is this 

 genus that it is often included under it, and we so find it 

 in Gray's Manual. The characters which separate the two 

 are the leafy stem, the stouter habit, and larger flowers, 

 and the nervation of the petals, which in Scilla have 

 always a single midnerve, while in Camassia there are 

 from three to nine nerves, showing most plainly after 

 the flowers are dried. 



The first known species was discovered by Captains 

 Lewis and Clark in September, 1805, upon their expedi- 

 tion across the continent. After a difficult passage across 

 the Bitter Root Mountains, by what is now known as the 

 Lolo trail, during which they had found little grass for their 

 animals or game for their own sustenance, they came out 

 on the tenth day upon an open meadow and to an In- 

 dian village, where they were hospitably received. The 

 Indians " set before them a small piece of buffalo-meat, 

 some dried salmon, berries, and several kinds of roots. 

 Among these last is one which is round and much like 

 an onion in appearance and sweet to the taste. It is 



='"C. Cusickii. Walson, Proc. Am. Acad. xxii. 479. Bulbs clustered, lar^e; leaves 

 glaucous, siibundulate, numerous, ttie larger two feet long by one and one-half 

 Inches wide ; stem leaf>', two or three feet high ; pedicels'end linear subscarious 

 bracts about an inch long ; flowers regular, pale blue, the narrow petals crisped 

 near the base, 3-5 nen-ed, persistently spreading, an inch long ; capsule oblong, 

 transversely veined. 



