a circle of the bark from the branch of a pear-tree.  Tournefort seems inclined to this opinion; who says, that the figs in Provence and at Paris ripen sooner, if their buds be pricked with a straw dipped in olive-oil.  Plumbs and pears punctured by some insects ripen sooner, and the part round the puncture is sweeter.  Is not the honey-dew produced by the puncture of insects? will not wounding the branch of a pear-tree, which is too vigorous, prevent the blossoms from falling off; as from some fig-trees the fruit is said to fall off unless they are wounded by caprification?  I had last spring six young trees of the Ischia fig with fruit on them in pots in a stove; on removing them into larger boxes, they protruded very vigorous shoots, and the figs all fell off; which I ascribed to the increased vigour of the plants.]

        So sleeps in silence the Curculio, shut
410 In the dark chambers of the cavern’d nut,
        Erodes with ivory beak the vaulted shell,
        And quits on filmy wings its narrow cell. 
        So the pleased Linnet in the moss-wove nest,
        Waked into life beneath its parent’s breast,
415 Chirps in the gaping shell, bursts forth erelong,
        Shakes its new plumes, and tries its tender song.—­
        —­And now the talisman she strikes, that charms
        Her husband-Sylph,—­and calls him to her arms.—­
        Quick, the light Gnat her airy Lord bestrides,
420 With cobweb reins the flying courser guides,
        From crystal steeps of viewless ether springs,
        Cleaves the soft air on still expanded wings;
        Darts like a sunbeam o’er the boundless wave,
        And seeks the beauty in her secret cave.
425 So with quick impulse through all nature’s frame
        Shoots the electric air its subtle flame. 
        So turns the impatient needle to the pole,
        Tho’ mountains rise between, and oceans roll. 
        Where round the Orcades white torrents roar,
430 Scooping with ceaseless rage the incumbent shore,
        Wide o’er the deep a dusky cavern bends
        Its marble arms, and high in air impends;
        Basaltic piers the ponderous roof sustain,
        And steep their massy sandals in the main;
435 Round the dim walls, and through the whispering ailes
        Hoarse breathes the wind, the glittering water boils. 
        Here the charm’d BYSSUS with his blooming bride
        Spreads his green sails, and braves the foaming tide;
        The star of Venus gilds the twilight wave,
440 And lights her votaries to the secret cave;
        Light Cupids flutter round the nuptial bed,
        And each coy sea-maid hides her blushing head.

[Basaltic piers. l. 433.  This description alludes to the cave of Fingal in the island of Staffa.  The basaltic columns, which compose the Giants Causeway on the coast of Ireland, as well as those which support the cave of Fingal, are evidently of volcanic origin, as is well illustrated in an ingenious paper of Mr. Keir, in the Philos.  Trans. who observed in the glass, which had been long in a fusing heat at the bottom of the pots in the glass-houses at Stourbridge, that crystals were produced of a form similar to the parts of the basaltic columns of the Giants Causeway.]