Secretary's Budget. ' 347 



Do not accuse the " bugs ! " No matter if you " see the very 

 spot where the critter stung " the rotting grape, and find the worm 

 inside, be assured that he is not jjarticeps critninis m the tresspass, 

 under consideration. The grape rot results from the growth of a 

 vegetation — a saprophyte — one of the great family of cryptogams, 

 which, in characteristics of growth, resemble the visible fungus 

 known as the mushroom. Its growth is rapid, as is that of most fungi, 

 and it feeds upon tlie sap or juices of the grape. By botanists it 

 has been identified, classified, named " Phoma Uricola/' and is also 

 known under a distinctive appellation, with which I believe I 

 baptized it, as the American grape rot. When first studied here it 

 was unknown in Europe. There is no longer a doubt concerning 

 its nature. 



It is invisible to the unaided eye, except m its fructification. 

 The little seed balls or " perithecia" which contain the seeds or 

 germs of this living thing may be distinctly seen pimpling the 

 surface of the diseased grape, like innnitessimal shot situated be- 

 neath the skin. They ai'e numerous, at a rough estimate certainly 

 not less than a thousand of them occupying the superficies of 

 a single berry. Each of these seed balls contains a mass of spores 

 or seed, at least a thousand, which are visible only when greatly 

 magnified, and each of these sj^ores is compounded of six germs, 

 Avhich are probably the ultimate sources of propagation. Here 

 we have, then, without exaggeration, one thousand multiplied 

 by one thousand multiplied by six, or six millions of seed, dissem- 

 inable by this prolific fungus from the surface of a single rotten 

 grape. The perithecinm, when mature, bursts, rupturing the 

 epidermis of the fruit, beneath which it is located, and extrudes 

 its contents of compound spores, which when dry float off in the 

 atmosphere, dividing and scattering as they go. I have witnessed 

 this evolution in the field with the microscope. 



The spread of these multitudinous spores can hardly be called 

 a dissemination. We need some more pervasive term. When the 

 disease is prevalent, as it has been here, it is an invisible fog of 

 infection, almost as subtle as the air on which it floats. It needs 

 familiarity with microscopic inspections and microscopic measure- 

 ments of size and numbers to gain a realizing sense of the vast 

 minuteness of the subject. It is so mighty small and so infinitely 

 enormous that one must draw a little upon faith — that "evidence 

 of things unseen "^n order to "take it m." Those yet in doubt 

 as to '• whether our earth is round," or who "reckon that the moon 

 is nigh onto several hundred miles off," need not attempt it. They 



