1847.] Brajid in the Cereals. 183 



their tender, slimy substance. But soon it is observed, that par- 

 ticuhu- boughs of this little plant are branched out, and in indi- 

 vidual cases yet more developed, branches and twigs stand closely 

 crowded together. At the same time with this branching, the 

 fibres are already partially separated into small globular bodies, 

 sometimes at the base, and sometimes at the point of the fibres; 

 but for the most part their little side branches first separate off 

 themselves. Many fibres are wholly changed into little branches 

 in a wreathed form, which still hang together. They are origin- 

 ally ellipsoidal and then become more or less globular, are at first 

 of a yellowish and afterw^ards of a brownish color, and at last 

 brown. But they likewise separate themselves from the branches 

 producing them, and often before they have reached their normal 

 size, which follows after their separation as it were by a sort of 

 after ripening. By and by all the fibres fall away into such spores 

 or grains of brand; by and by too the cells of the diseased vege- 

 table substance are destroyed, and if we carefully cut through 

 lengthwise (Fig. 1, b), the brand bladders not yet opened or sprung 

 apart (Fig. 1, a); we find that the white cellular substance ap- 

 pears to be interwoven with irregular masses of brand, partially 

 isolated and in the form of cells; the cellular substance which 

 still remains standing, forms white sheath walls, and cells, or bet- 

 ter described, deficiencies, the hollow space of which is filled with 

 the dark-brown brand. By and by this remains of the cellular 

 tissue constituting sheath walls, becomes absorbed, and only the 

 outer skin of the brand bladder continues standing; but it begins 

 likewise to be colored reddish, or smutty, to become wrinkled or 

 in folds, to dry up and finally to tear open, by which the substance 

 of the brand spores is emptied and as it were sown out. This 

 species of brand causes manifold degenerations of particular parts 

 and organs of the mother plants. On the stalk it forms irregularly 

 rounded brand bladders, very greatly differing in size. On the 

 female blossoms it never attacks all "the blossoms (hluthen) of an 

 ear; the blossoms on the top of the ear are for the most part more 

 exposed to the brand than those at the base. Often only those 

 fruit buds that stand at the very tip, and frequently only the basi- 

 lar ones are diseased. Here the brand attacks only the fruit knot 

 and changes it directly into a brand bladder; so that indeed a 

 person may find on the latter still the remains of the wasted pistil. 

 But the rachis (midrib?) itself I have never found entirely gone. 

 More frequently it seizes on the husk leaves, and then changes the 

 whole ear or the fruit bearing branch into an organ not unlike a 

 pine apple, it thickens all the leaves and forms them similar to 

 the scales of a fir cone. But in the male blossoms {hluthen') the 

 brand seizes on the receptacle and the anthers, more rarely the 

 petals and changes all these organs into white, curled-up, easily- 



