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were immune to the germs of infection, to obtain an almost dogmatic significance. Without doubt 

 this holds good so far as the vegetative part of the plant is concerned. However, it does not hold 

 good any longer, when the embryonic blossom buds appear and the young ovaries with pistil and 

 sigma now become accessible from without. It would indeed be remarkable if the young ovaries 

 in maize alone should be accessible and the pistillate blossoms in all other plants would not be 

 capable of being infected. 



This consideration caused me soon to take up infection of the blossoms in our varieties of 

 grain, which, however, were resultless, since the external conditions were as unfavorable as pos- 

 sible for this infection. Plants infected in the open air, or in the grain fields, were injured by 

 birds or cut down before the seed had been harvested. It was possible to observe only the pene- 

 tration of the germs of infection into the young ovaries. Beyond this, experiments were frus- 

 trated. However, in the infected blossoms, so far as the observations were carried on, no smut 

 appeared that same autumn. My time being taken up by other investigations, I let the experi- 

 ments stop here, only to resume them later in a different place and with better resources. This 

 was after my removal to Breslau. It became clear from a number of preliminary experiments 

 that, without the assistance of a valued and experienced fellow worker and without the resources 

 of an experimental field, investigation in this direction could not lead to very profitable results. 



I found the long wished for fellow worker in my scholar and assistant, Dr. Richard 

 Falck, and the Cultusministerium, at my request, generously granted the resources proved neces- 

 sary for carrying out blossom infection in detail. Thus more than four years ago, we began the 

 new investigation of blossom infection as it exists supposedly in smut fungi, and the following 

 results are the outcome of the work done with my young friend, Dr. Richard Falck. 



