Natural History. i9l 



of efgot was the puncture of the healthy grain by the fly, it 

 occurred to me, that, perhaps, it might be produced by such 

 means as I possessed. To ascertain this fact, with the point of a 

 needle I punctured four grains of rye in the same head, it then 

 being in a green pulpy state, and of full-grown size. A dis- 

 charge of the juice of the grains was soon discovered from the 

 orifice of each. The flies collected as in those cases before men- 

 tioned. The result was, that on the fourth day after the opera- 

 tion was performed, ergot appeared in the glume, occupying the 

 places of two of the punctured grains. The other two grains ex- 

 hibited no symptoms of decay, but continued in a healthy 

 state. From appearances I am led to believe, that in warm dry 

 weather many grains of rye are punctured, which are not ma- 

 terially injured thereby. The orifice closes before a sufficient 

 quantity of juice has escaped to produce fermentation and de- 

 cay. This may, therefore, be assigned as one reason why cloudy 

 and wet seasons are so much more productive of ergot than those 

 which are fair and dry." 



Not being able at any time to discover, by a microscope, the eggs 

 or larva of insects in the rye, General Field concludes, that the 

 object of the fly is simply food. The fly is of the hairy or bristly 

 species, and deposits its eggs upon animal flesh, either fresh or 

 putrid. The culm of rye did not seem affected by the ergot, but 

 where there were eight or ten grains of the latter, no sound rye 

 occurred in the head, the rye then apparently suffering a severe 

 blight. The size of the ergot is in proportion to the number 

 of grains in a head ; where there is but one, it is from ten to 

 fourteen lines in length, and two or three in diameter ; but 

 where there are from twenty-five to thirty grains, and that is 

 not unfrequent, they are often not larger than sound rye. — Sil~ 

 liman's Jour. ix. "359. 



15. Action of Poisons upon the Vegetable Kingdom. By M. Marcet. 

 —A very interesting memoire, by M. F. Marcet, on the action of 

 poisons upon vegetable life, has been read to the Societe de Phy- 

 sique et d'Histoire Naturelle of Geneva. The object of the 

 author in the experiments he instituted was, in the first place, 

 to ascertain the action of those poisons which act on animals by 

 inflaming and corroding the part with which they come in contact ; 

 and in the second place, the action of such poisons, especially 

 those of a vegetable nature, which destroy animals by their 

 effects on the nervous system. " Until now," the author remarks, 

 " plants have been supposed to be distinguished from animals by 

 the absence of organs corresponding to the nerves of the latter 

 class ; but the results of the experiments tend to prove that they 

 are capable of being affected by such poisons in a manner analo- 

 gous to that in which animals are affected by them. The experi- 



