The Natural History of Selborne

Codlins came in for stewing. Wasps encrease & gnaw the cherries. Hung bottles to take the wasps.
“Contemplator item, cum se Nux plurima silvis
Induet in florem, & ramos curvabit olentis:
Si superant foetus, pariter frumenta sequenterur;
Magnaque cum mango veniet tritura calore.”*
If by Nux in this passage Virgil meant the Wall-nut, then it must follow, that he must also mean that a good wall-nut year usually proves a good year for wheat. This remark is verifyed in a remarkable manner this summer with us; for the wallnut trees are loaded with a myriad of nuts, which hang in vast clusters; & the crop of wheat is such as has not been known for many seasons. The last line seems also to imply, that this coincident, even in Italy, does not befall but only in a dry, sultry summer. Tho’ wall-nut-trees in England blow long before wheat; yet it is probable that in Italy, where wheat is more early than with us, they may blossom together. And indeed unless these vegetables had accorded in the time of their bloom, the Poet would scarce have introduced together as an instance of concomitant fertility.