15 OCTOBER 1932, Page 15

ECCENTRIC WINDFA LI.s.

One oddity of this autumn has struck many observant gardeners in the villages. The apples have shoved themselves off the trees by their own fatness. What happened was that at one period the pulp " plumped," as Keats says, too rapidly for the stalk, which it nearly swallowed and presently broke off by shoving against the twig, as the marks on the skin disclose. So sizable windfalls have been beyond precedent in some of the more popular varieties ; and what seemed likely to be a great harvest is after all not more than a moderate.

W. BEACH THOMAS.