96 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



The deterioration of the potato was observed in Prussia more 

 than 60 years ago. In Germany a soapy taste has been observed 

 for more than 40 years. 



Notwithstanding these evidences of a coming pestilence, no 

 sanitary measures were taken. The majority of farmers treated 

 the potato as if its acme of hardiness was impossible to obtain — as 

 if its vigor was absolutely incapable of injury by climatic changes, 

 defective seed, indiiferent culture or stimulating manures. 



The cause of the disease is still regarded by many as a mystery 

 "sealed with seven seals." It has been exceedingly fruitful of 

 theories, but many a theorist has shown his wisdom in his retreats, 

 rather than in his victories ; has evinced a knowledge more of 

 secondary than of primal causes. 



Says a distinguished writer : " The Almighty has established 

 certain laws by which animal and vegetable life are perpetuated, 

 and although man may, for a time violate these laws with benefit 

 to himself, ultimate destruction ensues. Look at the potato as it 

 comes from the hand of its Maker, a rank weed bearing a few 

 tubers of no value to man, but plenty of blossoms, plenty of seed, 

 sowing itself and perpetiiating its kind ad infiniiuni and in infinite 

 variety. Man steps in now and modifies the original law ; he 

 ignores the seed, the true life, but selects a tuber and plants it 

 instead, tenderly cares for it, stimulates an abnormal growth, 

 increasing its size and improving its edible qualities, and calls it 

 one of the best gifts of Providence. But the potato lives an 

 individual life, not from ' generation to generation,' (like wheat 

 reproducing itself according to its primal law,) and as an indi- 

 vidual must succumb like a man to the inevitable feebleness of age. 

 It can now hardly raise its own head. Its sapped vessels are 

 weakened ; a hot sun after a moist day, the most stimulating- 

 weather for growth, causes such a rushing circulation that the • 

 almost decayed arteries burst under the pressure, and blight and 

 destruction ensues, just as the same causes rust in wheat. It is 

 probable also, that this gradual decay has produced a change in 

 the fluids of the plant, rendering them less rank than in its 

 vigorous condition,' and more inviting to the insects now preying 

 upon it. It is evident that death is coming over the whole species, 

 and in a few years it will be utterly extinct, in spite of the so- 

 called remedies suggested by fumbling among second causes — 

 instead of digging down to the great underlying laws of God in 

 nature," 



