147 



ORKNEY AND SHETLAND ISLES. 



and others grow, various willows niio;ht be cultivated, silited 

 for wicker-work and cooperage. Salix fragilis or crack- 

 willow would grow freely ; it makes large shoots every 

 season, and bears cropping admirably. It answers well for 

 making crets, cradels, and large baskets. The name fragt- 

 lis only intimates that the annual shoot is very easily de- 

 tached from the trunk, the twig itself being very flexible 

 and tough. Salix virainalis or common osier, also grows 

 very freely, and is much in request by ceopers. Salix 

 Helix, or rose willow ; S. triandra, or long-leaved osier ; 

 and S. vitellina or yellow osier, would doubtless succeed, 

 and they are all employed in basket-making. To these 

 might be added S. Forbyana or basket osier, tor the nicer 

 kinds of Avork ; and S, Russelliana, which would be very 

 useful not only for making crets and creels, but in tanning, 

 — the bark being superior for this purpose perhaps to oak- 

 bark. A decoction of it would form an excellent liquor in 

 which to steep their herring nets. 



Molucca Heans, 

 I have lately observed a paper " on the beans cast ashore On the Mo- 

 in Orkney," in Philosophical Transactions 1696, No. ri22, '"'^^a beans 

 1- o- TT c-i TT ,• ,1 •. . , , cast ashore c 



by air Hans Sioaue. He mentions three kinds as pretty Orkney. 



common : the Cocoon : the Horse-eye-bean ; and the Ash- 

 coloured nickar. The two former are the kinds which I 

 got in the islands, in 1804. The cocoon of Sloane is 

 evidently the seed of the Mimosa scandens of Linnseus, the 

 Gigalobium of Brown's " Jamaica." It is "the largest of 

 the beans figured in Wellace's " Description of Orkney," 

 1693. 2. The horse^eye-bean of Sloane is distinctly the 

 seed of Dolichos urcns Lin. ; the Zoophtahnum of Brown, 

 who calls the s&ed, ox-eye-bean. This is the smaller bean 

 figured by Wallace, and is easily known by the hilus or 

 welt which surrounds it, and which gives it somewhat the 

 appearance of a horse's or ox's eye. 3. The ash-coloured 

 nickar is the seed of the Guilandina bonduc Lin. It is not 

 so commonly found as the others. It is a perfectly round 

 hard seed, little larger than a musket-bullet. 



Herring-Fishery. 

 This immense field for in(!ustry, — this inexhaustible source Verv frreat 



of 



