598 ICOSANDRIA. PENTAGYNIA. Mespilus 
PENTAGYNIA. 
MESPPLUS.* Cal. five-cleft: Petals five: ( Apple deeply 
concave at the top, one, two, or five-celled. E.) 
Kamschatka the haws are fermented into wine. It often happens that during the spring 
months, Hawthorn hedges suffer so severely from the ravages of insects, (combined with 
other less understood causes of blight), that the leaves are entirely consumed ; the hedges 
presenting, for a long extent, the appearance of winter sprays, covered only with a 
cottony web. Of the caterpillars engaged in this denuding process, the principal performers 
have been found to be the larvse of the little Ermine Moths Phalcena Evonymella , and 
P. Padella. E.) The wood is hard and tough, and is formed into axle-trees and handles for 
tools : (is good for the turner’s use ; combs were formerly made from the root. The seed 
of the Hawthorn seldom vegetates till the second year; but if turkeys he fed with these 
haws, and their egesta be planted in drills, the young plants appear above ground the first 
year: a fact from which it might not unreasonably be inferred that by the timely applica¬ 
tion of stimulating manure a crop may be raised the first season. Evelyn has the following 
curious remarks on this subject. ‘‘The haw, and many other seeds, being invested with a 
very hard integument, will now and then suffer imprisonment two whole years under the 
earth; and our impatience at this does often frustrate the resurrection of divers seeds 
of this nature ; and thus will the seed of hollies, (concerning which there goes a tradition, 
that they will not sprout till they be passed through the maw of a thrush), sleep two entire 
years in their graves: also sometimes yew and sloe.’’ But the same accurate authority 
further observes that the vegetation of such seeds may be ensured and expedited by being 
“ washed, then buried and dried in sand a little moist, any time in December, and so kept 
in some vessel in the house all winter, and in some cool shady place abroad all summer ; 
sow them the spring after : ” thus ensuring the best of all fences, the 
“ Tutela naturalis et viva.” Varro. 
Tire different species of Crataegus afford nourishment to Papilio Cratcpgi ( Arctia 
chrysorrhcea , A. phceorrhcea , Noctua Oxyacanlhce , Curculio nitens , Pyrochroa rnbens , 
Elodes pallida, Bilunts tomentosus and fumatus, Lagria hirta, Mor della aculeata , Chilo - 
Cacti , and quadri-vcrrucatus, Anaspis bifasciatus, Rhynchites cequalus , R. nanus , Ga- 
leruca Cratccgi, Haltica cerata, Pontia CraUcgi , Lasioc.ampa Cratcegi , Calliinorpha 
cceruleocephala , and Calosoma Inquisitor. The fortunate Entomologist may chance 
to discover nestled within the lovely blossom of the thorn, on a hot summer’s day, the 
rare Buprestis nitidula , brilliant as an emerald. Vid. Curt. Brit. Entom. v. 1. pi. 31. 
A very destructive parasitic fungus, well known to gardeners as a kind of mildew or 
blight, and commonly taken for an insect, frequently attacks and distorts the younger 
leaves of the Hawthorn, Apple, and Peach trees, and seems to result from a peculiar state 
of the atmosphere. It is Sporotrichum macrosporum , of Link : forming a “ pulverulent 
hoariness, interspersed with very minute tufts; filaments few, branched, straggling; spo- 
rules large, obtusely oval.” Grev. FI. Edin. The leaves are also subject to Erineum clan- 
desthium ; “ peridia lax, clavate, whitish ; often concealed by the involute, diseased margin of 
the leaf.” Grev. Scot. Crypt. 141.2; and JEcidium laceratum; Grev. Scot. Crypt. 209; “ pe¬ 
ridia densely aggravated, elongated, subimmersed, pale brown, irregularly torn ; sporidia 
brown, copious; ” a parasite of singularly curious structure, as displayed by Dr. Greville ; 
investing the leaves, small branches, and fruit of Hawthorn abundantly. Near the 
rustic bridge in the Belan grounds, at Wynnstay, North Wales, the Editor measured a 
Hawthorn six feet in girth, five feet from the ground, which may be considered an extraor¬ 
dinary size. As an isolated individual, few of its kind will be viewed with deeper interest 
than the identical Thorn planted by the hand of the ill-starred, hut fascinating Queen Mary, 
in the garden court of the Regent Murray’s house, and still extant. Its present dimensions 
are about five feet in girt near the base, dividing upwards into two branches, one neaily four 
* (From piaag, middle, and i r/Asw, to bind together $ referring to its astringent quali¬ 
ties. E.) 
