ON THE PRACTICABILITY OF FECUNDATING FLOWERS. 411 
bore plentiful crops, but very rarely any perfect bunches of equally 
swelled berries. Considering this defect to be constitutional, no reme¬ 
dial means were resorted to ; nor were we cognizant, at that time, that 
such defect proceeded from any accidental or natural impotence of the 
sexual organisation, notwithstanding some of our contemporaries used 
then to dust the dowers of their white Muscat of Alexandria with the 
pollen of other vines, to ensure the setting of the fruit. 
This kind of grape (the Sweet-water) is frequently planted on open 
walls, where it bears, and, in favourable summers, ripens well. It is 
worth remark, that the bunches in the open air are always more regular 
than those in houses, which is something like presumptive proof that 
confinement and fire-heat, unless very moderate, is less favourable to 
the functions of the flower than the open air. 
There are several other varieties of vines which usually produce 
unsightly bunches, and which, if the tree be well used in other respects, 
may be assisted by the easy and rational manipulation practised by Mr. 
Bristol with the black Lisbon ; and we strongly recommend the process 
to the attention of our readers. 
Nor need such a process be confined to the vinery : other fruit¬ 
bearing plants are benefited by employing similar means. Filbert 
trees are often unfruitful in consequence of the male flowers or catkins 
being killed by frost, or withered by dry air before the females are 
sufficiently developed. The tree, which is thus deprived of the service 
of its own catkins, must necessarily be barren for one season; but if a 
bough loaded with healthy catkins be cut from another tree, and sus¬ 
pended over the first, perfect nuts, in the usual quantity, will be pro¬ 
duced. Nor does it signify whether the borrowed branch be a filbert, 
as it has been found that a branch of the wild hazel does as well, if not 
better: showing that the wild original really possesses more sexual 
vigour than the highly cultivated and pampered filbert; a curious cir¬ 
cumstance in itself, and analogous to similar consequences observable 
in the animal kingdom. It may be added, that filberts produced from 
such impregnation, if sowed and raised to a fruit-bearing state, would 
resemble the male parent much more than they would the female. 
There is another circumstance which happens in a family having 
bisexual flowers (but only, as has yet been observed, to one variety of 
the genus), in which the female organs in some of the plants, and the 
male organs in others, are abortive; consequently neither singly can 
produce perfect fruit. A necessary practice is, therefore, to intermix 
them in planting, in order to have anything like a crop. This is no 
other plant than the Hautbois strawberry—a favourite fruit, but which 
is almost extinct, in consequence of the partial success attending its 
