AN ESSAY 



ON THE DISEASES OF THE GRAPE AND THE SUGAR CANE : 



BY C. E. GOODRICH. 



" Physiology and experience are, I think, fast verging to the 

 conjJusion, that atmospheric changes, that is weather or climate, 

 especially as connected with a course of culture too stimulating, 

 are the causes of almost all vegetable maladies; and not less the 

 cause similarly of almost all animal diseases. No plant or ani- 

 mal has a natural immortality. Climate and the stimulation of 

 culture are the falling weight by which both are kept, for a time, 

 in motion, and by which both are, in the end, run down." — Trans- 

 actions of the Patent Office, 1853, pg. 172. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The cultivation of the grape and the sugar cane is becoming a 

 matter of national interest. The liability of both to occasional 

 disease, is the greatest discouragement to their culture. The 

 views, taken in this paper, of those diseases will be announced 

 witli confidence and boldness, particularly in reference to the 

 grape, as being based on some little observation, both direct and 

 analogical. Let me here say, however, once for all, that I shall 

 hold opinions on this subject open to correction by those wliose 

 experience in vegetable pathology is wider than my own. Many 

 of the fullcjwing views are not in accordance with sentiments 

 widely received on the same topic, so far as I am acquainted with 

 the sentiments of others. They are not however, recent with 

 myself The si)irit of them will be found in my three essays on 

 the diseases of the potato, found respectively in the Transactions 

 of the N. Y. State Agricultiu-al Society for 1847, 1848, and 1851. 

 This last is found also in the Transactions of the Patent office for 



