888 ARBORETUM AND FRUT1CETUM. PART III. 



yellow, dotted with black, and it has a black head and tail, and very powerful 

 jaws. It is believed that it remains at least two years in the larva state ; a 

 month and a few days in the pupa state ; and two months or more as a per- 

 fect insect or imago. Some exceedingly interesting information respecting 

 this insect will be found in the Mag. Nat. Hist, vol.ii. p. 66. and 291., and 

 also in the Gard. Mag., vol. xii. iEcidium cancellatum Sowerb. is a fungus 

 that originates in the leaves of pear trees; and in moist seasons, and in close 

 situations, it sometimes appears to a great extent, occasioning a premature 

 falling of the leaves. There seems to be no remedy, but that of increasing the 

 airiness of the situation, and this may always be done to a certain extent by 

 thinning out the branches of the tree. An engraving of this fungus, which is 

 commonly called the blight, together with some interesting remarks on it, will 

 be found in the Gard. Mag., vol. ix. p. 32, 33. 



Statistics. The oldest pear trees in the neighbourhood of London are at Twickenham, where they 

 may be seen from 50 ft. to 60 ft. high, with trunks from 18 in. to 3 ft. in diameter; and, in all probability, 

 were from the nursery of (Jerard's " curious and cunning graffer, Master Richard Pointer," whose real 

 name was Corbett, and who was father to Bishop Corbett, the poet. (See Encyc. of Gard., edit. 1835, 

 § 1307.) In the Fulham Nursery, there is a seedling pear, 50 years planted, which is 60 ft. high. 

 In Nottinghamshire, at Old Baseford, there is a pear tree of the kind known as the brown domi- 

 nion, which, in 1826, was upwards of a century old. It is 40 ft. high, with a head 54 ft. in diameter, 

 and a trunk 2 ft. 3 in. in diameter. From 1806 to 1826, the produce of this tree, on an average, was 

 50 pecks of pears a year. In the year 1823, it bore 107 pecks, each peck containing 420 pears; and 

 in 1826 it produced 100 pecks of 279 pears each ; which, when gathered, weighed 20 lbs. each peck; 

 making a total of a ton weight of pears in one year. As the tree grows older, the fruit becomes 

 larger and finer; so that it requires more than 100 pears less to fill the peck now, than it did 26 

 years ago. This increase in the size of the fruit is, doubtless, owing to the field in which the 

 tree stands being frequently top-dressed with manure. In Herefordshire, " A very extraordinary 

 tree, growing on the glebe land of the parish of Hom-Lacey, has more than once filled 15 hogsheads 

 of peri y in the same year. When the branches of this tree in its original state became long and 

 heavy, their extreme ends successively fell to the ground, and, taking fresh roots at the several parts 

 where they touched it, each branch became as a new tree, and in its turn produced others in the same 

 way. Nearly half an acre of land remains thus covered at the present time [1805.] Some of the 

 branches have fallen over the hedge into an adjoining meadow, and little difficulty would be found 

 in extending its progress." [Rep.) Being anxious to know the present state of this celebrated tree, 

 we wrote to a highly valued friend, residing at Hereford, respecting it, and we have been favoured 

 with the following reply : — I have been this morning to see the far-famed pear tree. It once covered 

 an acre of land, and would have extended much further had nature been left to her own operations. 

 It is now not a quarter the size it once boasted ; but it looks healthy and vigorous, and when I saw it, 

 it was covered with luxuriant blossoms. The original trunk is still remaining ; and there are 

 young shoots which are only yet approaching the ground, but which seem nearly ready to take 

 root in it. The tree would completely have covered the vicarage garden if it had been allowed 

 to remain. It is said to have been in its greatest perfection about 1776 or 1777. There is 

 another tree of the same kind in the neighbourhood. Hereford, May 18. 1836 " In Scotland, 

 there are several large pear trees. Near Edinburgh, at Restalrig, in a garden adjacent to what was the 

 house of Albert Logan of Restalrig, who was attainted in the reign of James VI. (of Scotland, and the 

 First of England), and which was probably planted before his forfeiture, the tree, at 2| ft. from the 

 ground, girts 12 ft. It is of the kind called the golden knap, which, in Scotland, is generally con- 

 sidered as the best kind of tree to plant, when it is wished to produce timber. Dr. Neill has men- 

 tioned a number of very old pear trees, standing in the neighbourhood of Jedburgh Abbey, and in 

 fields which are known to have been formerly the gardens of religious houses in Scotland, which were 

 destroyed at the Reformation. Such trees are, for the most part, in good health, and are abundant 

 bearers ; and as some of them must have been planted when the abbeys were built, they are, pro- 

 bably, from 500 to 600 years old. 



*t 2. P. (c.) £alvifo v lia Dec. The Sage-leaved, or Aurelian, Pear Tree. 



Identification. Dec. Fl. Fr., 531., in a note; Prod., 2. p. 634. ; Don's Mill., 2. p. 622. 

 Synonyme. Poirier Sauger D'Ourch in Bihl. Phys. Econ., Mai, 1817, p. 299. 



Spec. Char., fyc. Branches thick. Buds tomentose. Leaves lanceolate, 

 entire, tomentose all over when young ; when adult, glabrous on the upper 

 surface. Fruit thick, long, fit for making perry. Wild and cultivated 

 about Aurelia, in France. (Dec. Prod., ii. p. 634.) Introduced by the 

 London Horticultural Society, in 1826 ; and, in our opinion, only a variety 

 of the common wild pear. 



¥ 3. P. (c.) mva v lis Lin.fil. The snowy-leaved Pear Tree. 



Identification. Lin. fil. Suppl., 253. ; Jacq. Fl. Austr., t. 107.; Dec. Prod., 2. p. 634. ; Don's Mill., 



2. p 623. 

 Engraving. Jac<j. Fl. Austr., 1. 107. 



Spec. Char., eye. Leaves oval, entire, obtuse, white and silky beneath. Co- 

 rymbs terminal. Fruit globose, very acid, except when ripe and beginning 

 to decay, when it becomes very sweet. (Dec. Prod., ii. p. 634.) A native 

 of the Alps of Austria, where it grows to the height of 10 ft. or 12 ft. It 

 was introduced into the Horticultural Society's Garden in 1826, or before; 



