‘“PLANT BREEDING IN U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE.” 801 
ABSTRACT OF AN ADDRESS ON “PLANT BREEDING IN 
THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE.” 
By Dr. Erwin F. Smirx, Pathologist in Charge of Laboratory of Plant 
Pathology, United States Department of Agriculture. 
THE speaker prefaced his remarks by saying that it was always dis- 
appointing to an audience to have to listen to a substitute ; that he was no 
plant-breeder himself but only a pathologist; that he had, however, been 
closely associated with the plant breeders of the Department since the 
beginning of the work, and might therefore be able to express the views 
of an intelligent layman, and, moreover, was deeply interested in that 
phase of the subject which relates to the production of plants resistant to 
disease. No one regretted more than he that Dr. Webber could not be 
present and speak with authority concerning these interesting facts. 
The subject is comparatively a new one in the United States Depart- 
ment of Agriculture, dating back not further than twelve or fourteen years. 
The Department has bred plants principally for four reasons, viz. 
(1) For resistance to disease. Hxamples of plants bred for this purpose 
are cotton, melon, and the grape vine. 
(2) For resistance to cold, e.g. citrous fruits. 
(8) For resistance to alkali, drought, &c., e.g. alfalfa, wheat. 
(4) For greater productivity, and for quality, in edible fruits, foliage, 
fibers, &¢., e.g. pineapple, tobacco, cotton, maize. 
Taking these subjects in order, I will first mention cotton. Some years 
ago the “Sea Island cotton” growers in the United States were greatly 
troubled by a mysterious disease which sometimes swept away entire 
fields of cotton, and often destroyed many plants in fields not so severely 
attacked. This disease persisted in ground once subject to it, and became 
more and more destructive as time went on, so that finally some of their 
best fields (tile-drained and heavily fertilised) had to be abandoned as 
waste land. I determined the cause of this troublesome disease to be a 
little fungus known as F'usariwm, which lives over winter in the soil and 
which attacks the plant through the root system, filling the vascular or 
water-carrying bundles with its threads, and in this way crippling or destroy- 
ing the plants. The work then assumed such proportions that it seemed 
wise to turn it over to an assistant, whose whole time should be given 
to the subject, in order, if possible, to find a satisfactory remedy for the 
widespread trouble. I picked out for this responsible post Mr. William 
A. Orton, then a recent graduate of the University of Vermont, who 
subsequently obtained most brilliant results in overcoming the ravages of 
this disease by means of selection. I might add in passing that Mr. Orton 
had never seen a cotton field until he went South on this perplexing and 
seemingly well-nigh hopeless mission. Very little was accomplished the 
first year. I well remember a notable conference with Mr. Orton at the 
close of the first season’s work, when he was thoroughly discouraged, 
