THE FAIlMEilS' CABINET, 



Devoted to Agriculture, Horticulture, and Rural aud Domestic Economy. 



Vol. IV.— No. 11.] 



6th mo. (June,) 15th, 1840. 



[Whole No. 65. 



KIMBER & SHARPLESS, 



PROPRIETORS AND PUBLISHERS, 



No. 50 North Fourth Street, 



PHILADELPHIA. 



Price one dollar por year.— For conditions see last page. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 On Rust, or Black Blight in Wheat. 



Sir, — As the season is fast approaching 

 when the rust, or black blight on wheat will, 

 in ail probability, make its appearance in 

 many parts of the country, I would call 

 the attention of your readers to an examina- 

 tion of the cause of the malady, and thus 

 enable them to provide a remedy for the 

 future in the shape of prevention, which is 

 in all cases, but more especially in this, 

 much more easy than cure, 



I remember, on the fourth day of last July, 

 seeing a large field of wheat on the borders 

 of the mill-race on the Brandywine, near 

 "Wilmington, Delaware, so completely cover- 

 ed with the rust as to be scarcely worth the 

 expense of harvesting, but which was, even 

 at that early period, in the midst of that 

 operation — it was, indeed, a caution to be- 

 hold ! I understand that this wheat had 

 been sown on a limed and manured fallow, 

 a cause alone sufficient in that situation to 

 account for all the evil. 



An excellent writer observes, "according 

 to our understanding of the principles which 

 regulate and determine the preparation and 

 application of the food of plants, must be 

 our notions of the diseases of plants, and our 

 ideas of the best mode or course of cultivating 

 them." A wide difference undoubtedly e.v- 

 ists in the formation, functions, and peculiar 

 nature of animals and vegetables, but yet 

 they may, in many respects, be assimilated ; 

 and thus, by comparison, the proper treat- j 

 ment of plants be simplified, and rendered 

 more easy of explanation and comprehension. , 

 I shall take leave to state that the observa-j 

 tions and experience of many years have 

 convinced me, that the opinions of the great, 

 reformer of the medical profession, Mr. Aber-i 

 neth}' — "that the most afflicting diseases toj 

 which the human species are subjected, are 

 generated in the stomach, and consequently 

 are to be remedied by the stomach," — are i 



Cab.— Vol. IV.— No. II 329 



perfectly just and well-founded ; and I am 

 also convinced that most of the diseases of 

 animals and plants may be accounted for 

 and remedied on the same principles. From 

 what has been said, it is clear that vegetables 

 cannot be supported without a due supply of 

 food, and that with those, as with animals, 

 the quantity and quality of food must possess 

 an equal influence. Now, every man is 

 aware that the quality of the food he con- 

 sumes is equally as determined in its effects 

 as the quantity, and such, no doubt, is the 

 case with plants, as above observed ; and 

 when an animal is constrained to live on 

 meagre, impure food, it is induced to con- 

 sume a greater quantity, to make up as much 

 as possible for the deficiency of quality, and 

 the consequence is, a distension of the sto- 

 mach and bowels ; and this is often followed 

 by a poverty and corruption of the fluids, 

 which produce disease and debility ; and the 

 body is wasted by eruptions, and becomes a 

 prey to vermin; and when an animal is glut- 

 ted with gross and rich food, a surfeit is the 

 consequence, and it is subjected to a stagna- 

 tion of the fluids, inflammations and erup- 

 tions, which often end in mortification and 

 death ; and plants, under the same circum- 

 stances, are subject to the same consequences ; 

 and these observations will be found cor- 

 rectly to apply to and afford a clear exempli- 

 fication of the rust, or black blight in wheat. 

 On this subject Sir J. Sinclair says, " It 

 appears from an able paper, written by a 

 distinguished naturalist, (Sir Joseph Banks,)' 

 that this disease is occasioned by the growth' 

 of minute parasitical fungus, or mushrooms 

 on the leaves, stems, and glumes, or chaff 

 of the living plants ; and that the roots of 

 the fungus, intercepting the sap intended by 

 nature fbr the nutriment of the grain, render 

 the grain lean and shrivelled, and in some 

 cases, rob it completely of its flour; nor is 

 this all, the straw becomes black and rotten, 

 unfit for fodder, or little better than a caput 

 mortuum, possessing neither strength or sub- 

 stance." And again, " several of the acci- 

 dents above enumerated, may contribute to 

 the production of rust, but there are two ad- 

 ditional circumstances which likewise tend to 

 promote it : first, having the land in too rich 

 a state for grain crops, and secondly, when 

 too frequent a repetition of crops of wheat' 



