In the month of October following, another correspondent says: "The ash-tree described by your correspondent grows by the side of Shirley Street, at the edge of Shirley Heath, in Solihull parish. The upper part of the gap formed by the chisel has closed, but the lower part remains open, and the tree is healthy and flourishing. Thomas Chillingworth, son of the owner of an adjoining farm, now about thirty-four, was when an infant about a year old passed through a similar tree--now perfectly sound--which he preserves with so much care that he will not suffer a single branch to be touched, for it is believed that the life of the patient depends on the life of the tree, and the moment that it is cut down, be the patient ever so distant, the rupture returns, and mortification ensues and terminates in death, as was the case in a man driving a waggon on the very road in question. Rowe's son was passed through the present tree in 1722, at the age of one or two. It is not, however, uncommon for persons to survive for a time the felling of the tree. In one case the rupture returned suddenly and mortification followed. These trees are left to close of themselves or are closed with nails. The woodcutters very frequently meet with the latter. One felled on Bunnan's farm was found full of nails. This belief is so prevalent in this part of the country, that instances of trees that have been employed as a cure are very common. The like notions obtain credit in some parts of Essex." With regard to the choice of a particular tree for these superstitious cures, Moor says: "The ash is said to be the tree always selected on these occasions, perhaps because it is more easily cleft than most others, and may more readily recover of such a wound. I have heard of a bramble being substituted, but not on ocular authority." There is no passage in the Christian or Hebrew Scriptures on which, as concerning the ash, the Talmudists or Targumists could in such proneness build anything mysterious. The ash is but once--Isa xliv. 14--mentioned in the Bible, and this is in a plain non-mystical manner.