1899] ERUPTION OF MAUNA LOA 249 
The Poison of Darnel. 
THAT the darnel (Loliwm temulentum) is a poisonous grass, is an old- 
established and familiar fact, and experts, at least, are aware of 
_Hofmeister’s research, which disclosed the presence of two active prin- 
ciples: temulin, obtained as chloroplatinate, which acts upon the 
nervous system, and the other, determined by the oily substances and 
fatty acids of the seed, which attacks the alimentary canal. A new 
interpretation, however, has recently been suggested by Mr. P. Guérin, 
of the School of Pharmacy in Paris (Botanical Gazette, xxvii. 1899, 
7136, 137). 
He has observed in the seeds of the darnel the almost constant 
presence of a fungus, to which it seems to him reasonable to assign 
the poisonous effects. This fungus, which is not the Hndoconidium 
temulentum of Prillieux and Delacroix, has also been detected by Vogl, 
Hanausek, and Nestler, but Guérin has shown its general occurrence, 
and that not only in the darnel, but in LZ. arvense With. (a variety of 
L. temulentum) and L. linicola Sond. as well. Its presence in perennial 
rye-grass is quite exceptional. Guérin has also made the suggestion 
that the temulin of Hofmeister may be the result of the action of the 
fungus upon the nitrogenous materials in the peripheral region of the 
seed. 
The fungus, which is always present in the form of mycelial fila- 
ments, appears at an early stage in the interior of the ovary, and 
invades the entire nucellus. It is afterwards crowded out by the 
development of endosperm after fertilisation, and comes to be restricted 
to the region between the hyaline layer (which represents the remains 
of the nucellus) and the outermost endosperm. ‘The observer found 
this disposition of the fungus in material from Bolivia, Brazil, Chih, 
Abyssinia, Persia, Syria, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Germany, and many 
localities in France. In forty seeds of most diverse origin the mycelial 
“zone was lacking only in three. 
Coppinia. 
WE are glad to note that Mr. C. C. Nutting, writing in the Proceedings 
of the United States National Museum (vol. xxi.), is able to bring 
forward some very definite proofs that the remarkable hydroid structure 
called Coppinia is a cluster of gonangia of Lafoéa. It is remarkable 
that Nutting’s investigations made upon the species Lafoéa dwmosa 
from Puget Sound were carried on independently of Levinsen’s investi- 
gations on Lafoéa fruticosa from Greenland, in which corresponding 
results were obtained. 
