74 Chronicles of Scrence. | Jan., 
civen by Dr. Seeman. The essential thing about a weed is, that it 
is out of place. A sunflower in a field of turnips is as much a weed 
as Brassica napus in a flower-garden, but reverse their situations, 
and the term is inapplicable to either. So when waste land, such 
as a heath, is enclosed and brought under cultivation, the species 
composing its original flora become weeds in the new fields. With 
regard to the term “weedy” Dr. Trimen thinks that it means 
something more than “soft and membranaceous,” many weeds being 
quite the reverse of this. From the situation of many “ weeds” in 
rich and manured soil, and amongst other and taller plants, they 
acquire a luxuriant and rapid growth and a straggling habit. It is 
these characters which are especially implied in the term according 
to the old proverb, “ Ill weeds grow apace.” Htymologically no 
doubt, as Dr. Trimen and others before him have remarked, “weed” 
is connected with the Anglo-Saxon “wedd,” which means clothing 
or covering either of earth or man. Hence our expression “ widow’s 
weeds.” 
Fungi and Gregarines in the Hair.—A somewhat acrimonious 
correspondence on the chignon parasite has been going on in the 
‘ Jourual of Botany’ between Dr. Beigel and Dr. Tilbury Fox. 
After the occurrence of small organic growths on prepared hair had 
attracted public attention, Dr. Beigel appears to have obtained 
specimens of the parasite, and sent them to the distinguished Ger- 
man algologists, Rabenhorst and Kiichenmeister. These gentlemen 
named the little plant—which is the simplest possible aggregation 
of highly refracting minute cells—Plewrococcus Beigelii—and Dr. 
Beigel related what they had done in the ‘Journal of Botany.’ 
Dr. Tilbury Fox, who is known as an observer and writer of great 
ability on skin diseases, published his opmion that the specific or 
even generic distinction of the parasite could not be maintained, and 
that like other fungoid growths, it was a function of the nidus 
rather than of the spore from which it sprang. The consequence 
has been a reiteration of the distinctiveness of his Plewrococeus by 
Dr. Beigel. The term Gregarine was unfortunately made use of by 
Lindemann, originally, in speaking of this growth; it is really, as 
admitted both by Drs. Fox and Beigel, most inappropriate— 
Gregarine being indubitably animals, and of endo-parasitic habit. 
Mr. John Bishop has described another case of Fungoid disease 
affecting the hair, to the Edinburgh Botanical Society. This occurred 
in the hair of the beard which, under its influence, broke off short, 
curling up and assuming a dried-up appearance as though singed. 
It appeared to be almost impossible to extirpate the fungus. 
Examination with the microscope showed a cellular fungus-growth 
within the hair—causing the destruction of the part by disrupting 
‘it from within. Sporules and mycelium branching among the broken 
fibres of the hair are occasionally to be seen. 
