703 



cut out with a pen-knife, and magnified with a moderately high power. 

 On the left hand the little oval figures represent the mouths (or sto- 

 mata, as botanists call them) in a healthy state ; on the right hand the 

 mouths are represented as choked up with the fimgus. Figs. 3 and 4 

 represent still smaller fiagments of straw, cut down longitudinally with 

 a sharp knife, so that a section only is exhibited. These two frag- 

 ments are of exactly the same size, and are magnified very highly. 

 In both instances the knife has passed through four stomata, or 

 mouths, and has exposed the little cavities in the substance of the 

 straw to which these openings lead. Those in figure 3 are repre- 

 sented as entirely filled with the fungus, which has forced itself 

 through the openings, and has somewhat the appearance of four short 

 wheat-sheaves. In the cells or cavities marked c and d, the fungus is 

 in a much younger state ; while at b the seeds only are visible at the 

 bottom of the cell ; and the cell a is entirely free from the parasite, 

 and in a perfectly healthy state. Fig. 5 represents a single fungus, in 

 its full-grown and mature state. It is now enormously magnified. 

 Finally, fig. 6 is another mature fungus, which, having split open with 

 its perfect ripeness, is dispersing its seeds in the air. At the end of 

 the stem of the fungus is a little lump or bulb, by which it is attached 

 to the straw. Neither Fontana nor Banks, nor, indeed, Bauer (the 

 gifted microscopist and draughtsman, to whom Sir Joseph Banks was 

 indebted for his admirable and most accurate figures), has mentioned 

 or drawn the roots of this fungus ; but it is so well known that all 

 Fungi have minute roots (or mycelia, as they are termed), permeating 

 every substance on which they fix, that I cannot doubt that the straw 

 of blighted wheal is also permeated by them, and that the fungus 

 increases by this means also as abundantly as from seed; a view that 

 seems almost established by the fact, that in some instances the outer 

 cuticle of the wheat-straw is split and broken up in all directions by 

 the multitude of funguses which are pressing outwards to gain access 

 to the air. 



Botanists term that part of the leaf of wheat and grasses which co- 

 vers the stem a sheath ; and these sheaths are equally furnished with 

 mouths, and therefore equally subject to the blight with the straw itself; 

 they receive the seeds of the blight, and grow it in their own mouths, 

 not allowing any passage for it to pass thi'ough and injure that part of 

 the straw which they conceal. This fact may be established to the 

 satisfaction of the most superficial inquirer by stripping the sheath off 

 the straw, when the portion which it had covered will be found per- 

 fectly healthy, clear, and free from blight. Hence to barley, in which 



