By the Rev. George Swayne. 



315 



nature, for forty or fifty years, and standing about six feet 

 apart. These I examined minutely. The scarlet blossoms 

 were in plenty, but I am confident there were not more than 

 twenty catkins in any degree of perfection on the whole four 

 bushes ; and the owner's wife informed me that they had 

 borne hardly any fruit for many years past. I then told 

 her, that if she wished to have any Filberts in the ensuing 

 season, she must immediately procure some branches of cat- 

 kins from the Nut-bushes in the hedges, and hang them upon 

 the tops of her Filbert- trees. She seemed much delighted 

 to hear that they could be made to bear by so easy a contri- 

 vance, and promised it should be done. I have since under- 

 stood that it was done, the next day. On the 7th of August, 

 1822, before the Filberts were ripe, and of course before I 

 could suspect there might have been any diminution of them 

 by depredation, I gathered every Filbert I could find on my 

 trees, and on counting and weighing the collection, found the 

 number to be eighty-six, and the weight half a pound. This 

 was a much greater produce than I had reason to expect from 

 the scanty appearance of the female blossoms in the month 

 of February, and proved, to my judgment, that the catkins 

 of the Hazel had wrought their due effect ; more especially 

 as there was not a single nut in the whole number without a 

 kernel, even in a cluster of nine, which I found among them ; 

 nor could I observe a maggot in either of them.* On the last 

 day of the same month (August 31st, 1821), my neighbour 



* In a communication from Mr. Williamson, with which I was favoured on 

 the 8th of March, 1 823, on this subject, he states, that last year not one Filbert 

 in forty icas good, owing to the ravages of the Nut-maggots ; but, query, might 

 not the failure have been caused by a deficiency of farina ? 



