222 E. J. BUTLER. 



directed to the bacteria present in the rotting tissues.' In the West 

 Indian Bulletin for 1906 (Vol. VI, p. 307) there is a general review 

 of the disease in the West Indies, and subsequent accounts of it 

 have been written by Mr. W. T. Home, Chief of the Department 

 of Vegetable Pathology, Central Agricultural Station, Cuba,^ by 

 Mr. F. A. Stockdale, Mycologist of the Imperial Department of 

 Agriculture, West Indies,^ and by Mr. J. R. Johnston of the United 

 States Department of Agriculture.' None of these have advanced 

 our knowledge of the cause of the disease, and Mr. Home records 

 that many inoculations with organisms isolated from the diseased 

 tissues have failed. 



In the East bud-rot of coconuts is also widely distributed. 

 It was described by Mr. T. Fetch, Government Mycologist, Ceylon, 

 in 1906, affecting a small area.^ He considered it to be the same 

 as the West Indian disease and attributed it to bacteria. He refers 

 to correspondence with Portuguese East Africa in 1903 which indi- 

 cates that the same disease occurs there. In the Philippine Is- 

 lands bud-rot causes great damages in several localities, and an ac- 

 count of it was published in 1908 in the Philippine Agricultural 

 Review.^ 



In 1906 the writer described a severe epidemic of disease in 

 palmyra and other palms in the Godavari District of the East Coast 

 of India.^ In intensity this surpassed the outbreaks in most other 

 countries, but it was confined to a comparatively limited area in 



^ J. H. Hart. Bud-rot disease of Coconuts, etc. Trinidad Botanical Department, 

 Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information, Oct. 1905, p. 240. 



2 W. T. Home. The Bud-rot and some other Coconut troubles in Cuba. Estacion 

 Central Agronomica de Cuba. Bulletin No. 15. English Edition, July 1908. 



3 F. A. Stockdale. Fungus diseases of Coconuts in the West Indies. West Indian 

 Bulletin, Vol. IX. 1909, p. 361. 



* J. R. Johnston. The Bud-rot of the Coconut palm. U. S. Dept. of Agriculture, 

 Bureau of Plant Industry, Circular No. 36, July 1909. 



f> T. Fetch. Bud-rot of the Coconut palm. Circulars & Agric. Journal of the Royal 

 Botanic Gardens. Ceylon. Vol. Ill, No. 15, April 1906. 



6 Philippine Agricultural Review, Vol. I. No. 5, May 1908, quoted in The Tropical 

 Agriculturist, Ceylon, Vol. XXXI, 1908, p. 555. 



T E. J. Butler. Some diseases of Palms. Agricultural Journal of India, Vol. I, p. 299, 

 Oct. 1906. See also Memoirs of the Department of Agriculture in India, Vol. I, No. 5, 1907, 

 p. 82, and Agricultural Research Institute, Pusa, Bull. No. 9, March, 1908, p. 21. 



