its battleground. All that one notices at first is a depression of the
bark extending in the long axis of a large branch. If one observes more
closely, he will find spore-bearing pustules occurring as little round
elevations upon the depressed part of the bark. The blight proceeds
slowly, and I pass about for examination specimens from two hazel limbs.
In the smaller one the blight has been two years under way, and in the
larger one three years. These patches of blight were allowed to grow
experimentally. Meanwhile, I trimmed out all other blight areas of the
bark with my jack-knife. This is very readily done. If one will look
over his hazel bushes once a year and simply whip out the few slices of
bark carrying the blight, it is done so easily and quickly that we now
need to have no fear whatsoever for the future of hazel culture in this
country.

If the members of the Association will examine these Cryptosporella
specimens which are passed about, and if they will dispose of the blight
according to directions, I feel that the hazel question involving a
matter perhaps of millions of dollars worth of investment has been
settled.

Among the foreign hazels which will thrive in this country the Byzantine
hazel, _Corylus colurna_ is by all means the most beautiful. It makes a
tree as large as the ordinary oaks, and in Hungary I have seen a trunk
three feet in diameter at a short distance above the ground. I have been
told that a single tree of this species will sometimes bear about twenty
bushels of nuts at a single crop. This presumably refers to the nuts in
their large involucral mass,--say four or five bushels of husked nuts.
The wood of these species is hard, takes a high polish and is valuable.
The tree itself is strikingly beautiful as the members will observe this
afternoon when examining the Byzantine hazels which Superintendent Laney