27 



CHAPTER 3. 



JUSTIFICATION FOR REMARKS ALREADY 

 MADE, AND FINAL CONCLUSIONS. 



I wrote the substance of "the two preceding chapters in 

 the year 1876j some of my remarks having been printed in 

 pamphlet form and the remainder having appeared in the 

 Madras Athenseum and Daily News, to the Editor of which 

 I am deeply indebted for his many kindnesses in regard to- 

 the subject. I have patiently waited in the vain hope that 

 some scientific person wonld come to our rescue, but what 

 has been the result? In a recent number of the Ceylon Ob- 

 server, I find that a sort of retrograde movement is all that 

 has to be chronicled, and that after nearly eight years inves- 

 tigation some of the leading "Scientists" have been CHARG- 

 ED with entertaining the idea that Hemileia Vastatrix "was 

 in the very blood of the plant, the germs permeating and 

 flowing with its life juices.-" Further on we are told " the 

 eye observations of practical planters as well as the miscro- 

 "scopic researches of more scientific observers unite in the 

 "conclusion that the affection is purely external/ 7 



Now Mr. Cooke in his report gave me. -credit for distin- 

 tinguishing the difference between Leaf Disease and the 

 Rot, the former being as I remarked a fungoid efflorescence 

 and the latter a fungoid deposit. He further stated that the 

 "Hemileia was a veritable endophyte developing in the tis- 

 "sues of the leaf, expanding outwards, as is the case with the 

 "red rust of corns and grasses." Now let us consider what 

 an Endophyte is> On turning up for information in my old 

 Book on Botany the author of which I regret I am .unable 

 to name, owing to the title page having been lost, I find 

 "that three types Uredinacece, the Nemasporacece and the 

 "Sporodismiacece collectively form the section Uridinoe, the 

 "first or lowest of the order Vredinales or Mucedinales. By. 

 Fries they have been called "Fungi Entophyti" and 



