COMMON BEECH. 



319 



so deserving of cultivation as some of the pendulous va- 

 rieties that have accidentally occurred in different localities, 

 such as that at Oriel Temple, in Ireland, another in North- 

 amptonshire, mentioned by Loudon on the authority of the 

 Rev. M. J. Berkeley, or a third that we have been in- 

 formed of by W. 0. Trevelyan, Esq., now growing at 

 Craigo, in Forfarshire, a fine nourishing young tree of 

 about thirty years 1 growth, and as pendulous in its character 

 as any of those mentioned or figured in the " Arboretum 

 Britannicum." The Beech generally preserves its form 

 and balance remarkably well, as it is not so liable as 

 many other forest trees to suffer from storms of wind 

 and snow ; its limbs and larger branches, from the angle 

 they form with the trunk, presenting less leverage, and 

 the slender nature of its spray offering much less resistance 

 than where it is heavy and thick. 



The diseases to which it is subject seem very few, for 

 the smooth nodes often met with upon the trunk and 

 larger branches seem in no way injurious to its health or 

 growth. Loudon seems to think these may originate from 

 the puncture of an insect, like the galls upon other trees ; 

 we have not been able to verify the fact, and are rather 

 inclined to attribute them to some slight local derange- 

 ment, or the extravasation of injured sap-vessels. The 

 leaves are sometimes a little disfigured by a tufted pimple 

 or excrescence, by some botanists considered to be a fungus, 

 but which the Rev. M. J. Berkeley, one of the first cry- 

 ptogamists of the age, believes to be a disease produced by 

 suborganisation of the cellular tissue. 



Unlike the oak, whose wood and foliage afford food 

 to whole armies of insects, the Beech is comparatively 

 attacked by few, its principal enemies being caterpillars 

 belonging to the Lepidoptera. Amongst these the following 



