218 DISEASES OF FIELD & GARDEN CHOPS. [CH. 



potatoes and the ergot of rye are so much alike that if a 

 large number were mixed together it might be no easy 

 task to distinguish in every instance one from the other. 

 Ergot is described in old botanical books as Sclerotium 

 clavus, D.C., or Spermadia clavus, Fr. 



If we keep ergots all through the winter on moist 

 sand on a garden bed, or indoors, they will germinate in 

 the early summer precisely in the same way as the 

 Sclerotia of potatoes already described ; and although the 

 ergots will not produce a Peziza as the potato Sclerotia 

 did, yet they will give rise to a fungus of equal if not of 

 greater interest. 



If ergots are laid in a clean, moist, shady place in a 

 garden, they will germinate naturally in June ; or if a 

 search is made where dead ergotised rye or other ergotised 

 grasses have lain, the germinated ergots will sometimes 

 be found without difficulty. 



Just as different grasses vary a little in their time of 

 flowering, so ergots vary in their time of germination. 

 An early flowering grass is invaded by an early germi- 

 nating ergot, and a late grass by a late ergot. Grasses 

 and ergots alike flower and germinate at a somewhat 

 different period in the south of England and the north of 

 Scotland. Surrounding circumstances have modified the 

 habits of both grass and fungus. The range of time in 

 the flowering of grasses and germinating of ergots is in- 

 cluded in about three months. 



If we now take a germinated ergot such as either of the 

 two illustrated, twice the natural size, at Fig. 98, and 

 examine it, we shall see that it has produced several club- 

 shaped growths, curiously answering in appearance to, 

 although considerably smaller in size than, the Peziza 

 with the slender tortuous stem produced by the potato 

 Sclerotium, as illustrated, natural size, at Fig. 6. Like the 

 potato Peziza the growths from ergot have a somewhat 

 long tortuous stem and a cap, as illustrated the natural 

 size, at Fig. 100, and here the similarity ends. Each little 



