Studies on Crown Gam. oi Plants 399 



" some extremely interesting old trees '" and a plantation of about 

 1.600 species arranged according to natural orders and in such a 

 way as to remind him of the Harvard Botanical Garden. For Dr. 

 To\vnsend"s sugar beet investigation work, Dr. Arcangeli promised 

 to send seeds of a wild beet. 



On May 18 at Bologna, Smith found Dr. Victor Peglion at the 

 Scuola a Gradia Superiore " just fitting up a bacteriological labora- 

 tory [with] some good new apparatus." Peglion's school work 

 had just been completed and he was living at Ferrara as a 

 travelling inspector of vineyards and other crops. European studies 

 m plant pathology during the past decade had been " largely 

 devoted to fungous diseases of plants," ' But from him Smith 

 began to iearn anew concerning the research status in Italy of 

 several crop maladies believed possibly due to bacteria. Peglion 

 suggested that the tubercle disease of oleander " might perhaps 

 be caused by the same organism as the olive knot," but this Smith 

 thought " unlikely " however possible it was that the malady might 

 prove bacterial. The youthful and able Italian scientist promised 

 to send material of a bacterial disease of hemp in the region. 

 Brusone on rice was believed caused by root-asphyxiation and not 

 a bacterium. A leaf-spot of Trifolum was also believed by Peglion 

 to be non-bacterial in origin. So was a disease of strawberry 

 though this was believed by at least one authority to be bacterial. 

 Smith learned that " everyone smiles a little when [Gomes'] Bact. 

 giwnnis is mentioned, Peglion included." They discussed olive 

 knot and one or two other diseases. The plant pathologists of Italy 

 were "good men," Smith was told, especially Savastano, "a very 

 capable man." Funds, however, were lacking, and Peglion ended 

 their conference by saying, " Your Bureau of Plant Industry is a 

 model." 



En route to Milan, Dr. and Mrs. Smith stopped at Modena 

 where at a technical school he consulted Professor Luigi Macchiatti 

 and went on an excursion with Professor C. A. Marozzi to examine 

 rogna of the vine. This malady was believed by Peglion to be due 

 to bacteria. But, since he had not studied it and Baccarini said 

 it was distinct from mal nero. Smith interested himself in the 

 subject. He found the disease unlike anything he had seen on 

 vines in the United States, and he secured a promise that fresh 



° Fifty years of pathology, op. cit., 29. 



