State Library of NSW
[Page 140]
of the work is so familiar to me that I feel certain that it was in my Father's Library. If it were sold at the sale of his Books in 1846, it may still be in the Colony. I am very sorry to learn by the way that you have got among you one of the evils that modern [indecipherable] since Sismondi's time has suffered so much from the Oidium. Strange that that peculiar condition of the atmosphere which seems to call forth the full development of that Fungus should have obtained [indecipherable] in so isolated a part of the world as Australia. Spain you know is the only portion of the S. of Europe which has escaped its ravages. I thought from what I saw that this happy exemption might be owing to the thick coating of limestone dust which in the summer time spreads from the attrition of the roads over all the vegetation, but experiment in France showed that this was not the cause, so the absence of the Oidium has been attributed to its very dry climate. Should this be true Australia has not much to dread from this horrid pest. I was much
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