and impoverished growth point out the condition of the plant.

The notable exertions which vegetables occasionally make to obtain nutriment may be instanced by the fol. lowing rude drawing of an ash,-a tree which, in con

sequence of the profusion of its seed, we find more often scattered in wild and singular places than any other not propagated by the agency of birds, or conveyed by the winds. This one had originally been root. ed in the earth, upon the top of a wall, but nourishment being required beyond what was supplied by the precarious moisture of the scanty soil, its roots proceeded downwards, winding their way through the crevices of the stones into the earth beneath, and remained apparently incorporated with the masonry; the materials of this wall being wanted for an adjoining work, were so pulled out, as to leave the tree with all its roots detached, much as represented, with all its vegetative powers uninjured: the root B had stretched itself along the top of the wall, but how far it had extended in perfection, is uncertain, being broken away when I saw it first, The wood of the ash, when burned in a green state,

THE YEAR 1825.

259 will emit a fragrance like that which proceeds from the violet or mezerion, and this it will diffuse in particular states of the air to a considerable distance, a property that, I believe, is not observable in any other British wood: it is in the country only that we can be sensible of this, and it is particularly to be perceived in passing through a village when the cottagers are lighting their fires, or by a farm-house, when this wood, fresh cloven, or newly lopped off, is burning;-as the wood dries, this sweet smell is in a great measure exhaled with the moisture, for in this state we are not sensible of any odor arising from it different from other woods.

THE YEAR 1825.

We are naturally solicitous to look back upon seasons remarkable for atmospheric phenomena, and compare their results with those passing before us, though we may be fully sensible that no conclusions can safely be drawn from them, -a variety of circumstances not known, or not comprehended, combining to produce results beyond our means of calculation. There have been times when such recollections brought no pleasure with them, by displaying the injuries and sufferings that hurricanes and floods have occasioned; and thus we who were witnesses of the distress occasioned by the lamentable rains of 1793, and the several successive years, when every wheat-sheaf presented a turf of verdant vegetation, cannot récollect it without sorrow, or ever forget that famine in our land. Yet it is amusing, on some occasions, to note the extremes of weather that our island has experienced; for though in general our seasons pass away without any very considerable dissimilitude, still we have known periods of great irregularity, drought or moisture, cold or heat. The freezing of great rivers, with the roasting of animals and passage of carriages upon the ice, our calendars and diaries relate; but instances of an opposite temperature, affording less striking events, are not so fully detailed as might be wished. The winter of 1661 appears to have

260

PECULIARITIES OF

been remarkable for its mildness; and it is rather curious that, in the century following, the winter of 1761 should have been equally notable for the mildness of its temperature. The winter of 1795 seems to have partaken of none of the severity usual to the season; and the summer of 1765 was remarkable for its heat and dryness, and all vegetation being influenced by their effects, brought forth fruits and flowers in unusual perfection.

But perhaps the year 1825, taking all its circumstances, is the most extraordinary to be found in our annals. The winter of 1824-5 had been mild and wet; the ensuing spring dry, but with keen winds and frosty mornings, which greatly injured the fine blossoms that appeared on our fruit-trees; and the continued and profuse nightly fall of the honey-dew was quite unusual: the leaves of the oak, the cherry, and the plum, were constantly smeared and dropping with this clammy liquor, which, falling from the foliage on the ground, blackened it as if some dark fluid had been spilled upon it: the leaves of most of our stone fruits curled up, covered with aphides, and became deciduous; and their young shoots were destroyed by the punctures of these insects that clustered on them. This honey-dew continued to fall till about the middle of July, affording an abundant supply of food to multitudes of bees, moths, and other insects which swarmed about the trees. We rarely begin cutting our grass before the first week in July; but in consequence of the heat of June in this year, it was so drawn up, that much hay was made and carried by the 20th of June, which commonly is not accomplished till August. Our crops on good ground were considered as fair, though in general the chilling season of May had occasioned a deficiency; but all our clover crops and artificial grasses were harvested in the finest order, producing good-sized ricks and mows; yet their bulk was delusive, the provender cutting out light and strawy. The heat and drought continued, with very partial and slight showers of rain, all June and July; nor had we any thing like serviceable rain till the second of August. In consequence our grass lands

were burned up, and our fields parched, presenting deep fissures in all parts. The heat was unusually distressing all day; and evening brought us little or no relief, as every wall radiated throughout the night the heat it had imbibed from the torrid sun of the day. Our bedroom windows were kept constantly open, all apprehension from damps and night airs, which at other times were of the first consideration, being disregarded; a cooler temperature, however obtained, was alone required; and we lingered below, unwilling to encounter the tossings and restlessness that our heated beds occasioned. Our wainscots cracked, furniture contracted and gaped with seams; a sandal-wood box, which had been in use for upwards of twenty years in dry rooms, shrunk and warped out of all form; a capsule of the sandbox tree (hura crepitans), which had remained in repose over a shelf above the fire-place for an unknown length of time, now first experienced an excess of dryness, and exploded in every direction; door frames contracted, window sashes became fixed and immovable. These are trifles to relate, but yet they mark the very unusual dryness of the atmosphere.

any inIn towns, and

Monday and Tuesday, July 18th and 19th, will long be remembered as the acme of our suffering, the thermometer standing in the shade of a passage communicating immediately with the outer air, in an open situation, at 82° of Fahrenheit. A few yards nearer the air, on which the sun shone, it rose to 93°, without fluence from reflection or other causes. more confined places, it is said, the heat was much greater. The current of air now felt like that near the mouth of an oven, heavy and oppressive, and occasioning more unpleasant sensations than such a temperature usually creates; animals became distressed, the young rooks of the season entered our gardens, and approached our doors, as in severe frosts, with open bills, panting for a cooler element; horses dropped exhausted on the roads; many of the public conveyances, which usually travelled by day, waited till night, to save the cattle from the overpowering influence of the sun. The leaves of our apple and filbert trees, in dry situations, withered

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PECULIARITIES OF

up; large forest trees, especially the elm, had their leaves so scorched by the sun, that they fell from their sprays as in autumn, rustling along the ground; the larch became perfectly deciduous. In our gardens, the havoc occasioned by the heat was very manifest. The fruit of the gooseberry, burnt up before maturity, hung shrivelled upon the leafless bushes; the strawberry and raspberry quite withered away; the stalk of the early potato was perfectly destroyed, and the tubers near the surface in many places became roasted and sodden by the heat, few obtaining their natural size, and sold at this period in the Bristol market at twenty-four shillings the sack. A few choice plants were saved by watering them daily; but in general the exhalation from the foliage, by reason of the heat of the earth, was greater than the root could supply, the green parts withering as if seared by a frost.

On the 20th of July, some farmers began to cut their wheat; and by the 25th reaping had generally commenced. Our bean crop presented, perhaps, an unprecedented instance of early ripeness, being usually mowed in September; but this year it was universally ripe, indeed more perfectly so than the wheat, by the 1st of August. The crop, however, proved a defective one: water became scarce, and the herbage of the fields afforded so little nutriment, that the cows nearly lost their milk, eight or ten being milked into a pail that four should have filled; and one week, from July the 18th to the 24th, butter could not be made to harden, but remained a soft oleaginous mass.

This extreme heat had a favorable influence on many of our exotic plants, enabling several to perfect their seed, which do not usually in our climate; such as nightstocks, erodiums, heliotrope, groundsels, cape-asters, and such green-house plants vegetating in the open air. With me all the polyanthus tribe, especially the double varieties, suffered greatly; lovers of the cold and moisture of a northern climate, in this tropic heat, they became so parched as never properly to recover their verdure, and in the ensuing spring I missed these gay and pleasing flowers in my borders.