386 T^*''^ Fungi. [September, 



suppose tliat tliese sporules may pass into tlae circulation through 

 the spongioles of plants and develop their growth on fruit and stem ; 

 which development can only be prevented by the action of the more 

 powerful metalic salts. Fungi when they decay are subject in their 

 turn to the attacks of other fungi ; thus while they themselves are 

 parasitical they give rise to. and support another family of parasites ; 

 and to what extent this may go on we presume will remain long un- 

 determined. 



Most of the fungi are of a highly poisonous nature, and even those 

 kinds which in particular situations are not, become poisonous by a 

 change of soil. They differ from many noxious vegetables in this, 

 that their poison cannot be separated by boiling or even by distilla- 

 tion. Rapid growth is another marked characteristic of fungi. " To 

 grow up in a night and perish in a night," may be literally said of 

 some of them at least ; and if all the circumstances favoring their 

 development, as regards temperature, moisture and absence of light, 

 are present the earth is at once overrun with numerous families of 

 them. 



The fungi of the genus Accidlum and those of the allied genera 

 Uredo and Puccinia are formidable enemies of the farm, often 

 proving destructive not only to fruits and grains but to plants. The 

 rapid, irrepressible and devastating spread of one of the various 

 forms of fungi has but too recently manifested itself in the unexam- 

 pled destruction of our late promising grape crop, making almost a 

 clean sweep of this luscious fruit in a few days.* 



SMUT — BUNT — UREDO-FCETIDA. 



"We would here direct attention in our remaining remarks to one 

 species of fungi which has been very prevalent the past season, con- 

 fined so far as we are aware entirely to wheat, called in common lan- 

 guage smut or smut-hall, in England and on the continent hunt; 

 which name it derived in honor of an excellent cultivator who pub- 

 lished several memoirs on Bunt from the years 1735 to 1755, techni- 

 cally and botanically Uredo -foetida. This is perhaps the most formi- 

 dable pest to which our wheat crop is subject and has been the 

 destroyer of millions of bushels of the world's greatest cereal the 

 past season, for it not only usurps the stead of innumerable wheat 

 grains but poisons and taints the entire crop where it prevails, ren- 

 dering it unfit for bread and hence comparatively useless. 



» This subject is now und-r investii^ation by a Committee of the Cincinnati 

 Horticultural Society, and we forbear further remark upon it. 



