10 
area so vaiied in everything that nature produced,, 
that we had no very great industry overshadowing 
everything else as in other countries, where on the 
chief industry being affected widespread distress 
was occasioned. Other countries in Europe had 
been devastated by an insect called the phylloxera, 
which had almost put an end to the vineyard 
industry. In France alone a loss of something like 
fifteen millions a year had been caused, and miles of 
vineyards had had to be thoroughly rooted up 
branch and crop, for no cure could be found. This 
affected us in England, for the French brandies and 
wines were not only becoming dear and almost 
inaccessible to ordinary buyers, but they were 
becoming worse. The growers now had to go to 
Spain and the Greek islands to buy currants and 
raisins, and to manufacture their wines artificially. 
Then there was the Colerado beetle, and in Ceylon 
the coffee plants were blighted with what was 
called the leaf disease, but which was believed to 
be attributable to an insect. He could only say 
that they were to be congratulated in England that 
they did not possesss any such prominent industries 
as to make it a matter of life or death to them 
when one of them failed.—Sir Joseph Hooker first 
referred to the great benefit they had derived at 
Kew Gardens from Miss Ormerod’s researches, re¬ 
marking that to her and to her sister they owed some 
of the best illustrations they had of the ravages of 
insects upon plants. He could not but allude also 
to the elegance and clearness of the language em¬ 
ployed by Miss Ormerod in her paper as an illustra¬ 
tion that scientific matters might be put in a clear 
and simple form, so that all might understand them. 
Alluding next to the curious subject of galls, he 
said that for the last five or six months he had 
been receiving the most urgent representations from 
the principal surgeons of England, who desired 
him to devote more attention to the study of galls 
at Kew. Sir James Paget, in a recent lecture, 
had shown that a great analogy existed between 
the growth of these galls and of morbid tumours on 
the human body. Surgeons found it extremely 
difficult to examine the growth of these tumours in 
the soft tissues of the human body, but with plants, 
with their harder tissues, thev could follow them 
better, and according to Sir James Paget, an examina¬ 
tion of these galls would throw some light upon the 
treatment of the disease. They would probably 
agree with him that there could be no better place 
than Kew for pursuing such observations. Indeed 
Kew had become the referee in all questions 
