THE NEW AGRICULTURE. 203 



al journals of the country as they have come in my way, I confess 

 to have learned more since taking charge of Mr. Cole's model five 

 acres than during all the former years of my life. I am convinced 

 that the seeds of fungus are engendered under many other condi- 

 tions than those described in the following extract from Bulletin 

 No. 2 of the New Series treating of pear blight at the State Exper- 

 imental Station at Geneva. 



" ' The disease is due to living germs. These germs can multiply 

 indefinitely in any damp spot where there is decomposing vegetable 

 matter. From such places they are raised into the air when dry or 

 carried up by moisture. From the air they lodge upon the trees, 

 and when the conditions are favorable pass into the tissues and 

 cause blight. The conditions referred to are in geuei-al (1) very ten- 

 der tissues, such as are found within the flowers and at the ends of 

 expanding shoots in spring, and (2) a moist atmosphere. No vari- 

 eties are entirely blight proof, but the disease spreads so slowly in 

 some that they receive little injury, especially when not making too 

 rapid growth. The reason why the blight, when seen in July and 

 later, does not pass directly from one limb to another, or from one 

 tree to another, is because in the first place the germs cannot escape, 

 being confined by the bark, or else escape in a viscid exudation 

 which holds them firmly together, and in the second place there 

 are very few places on the tree at this time of the year where the 

 surface tissues are sufficiently tender for them to find an entrance.' " 



" Certainly the disease is due to living germs, nor is this all; for 

 in the air above, in the earth beneath, and in waters on and under 

 the earth are the seeds of death arising from decomposition and 

 from the stagnation of the waters, That these can everywhere be 

 kept in motion, regulated in their flow and kept at nearly uniform 

 temperature summer and winter, cannot be longer questioned, for 

 Mr. Cole has demonstrated the fact. He runs the rain water 



