June 24, 1921] 



SCIENCE 



575 



letter referred, contained the same statement, 

 indicating in addition that the 300 per cent, 

 additional charge would become effective on 

 and after May 1, 1921. 



C. Stuart Gagek 

 Brooklyn Botanic Garden 



QUOTATIONS 



CENTENARY OF THE FRENCH ACADEMY OF 

 MEDICINE 



Our Paris correspondent has told of the 

 celebration, beginning Dec. 20, 1920, of the 

 most important anniversary connected with 

 French medicine — the centenary of the Acad- 

 emy of Medicine, which has the same pre- 

 eminence in medicine that the general French 

 Academy bears in relation to the more liberal 

 arts. Its roster bears only the names of those 

 who have by years of achievement won recog- 

 nition in the profession, and there are few be- 

 low middle life who have been accorded the 

 honor of election. Trousseau, who received 

 the academy prize in 1837 for his classical 

 treatise on laryngeal phthisis, was considered 

 unusually fortunate in that he gained admis- 

 sion in his thirty-sixth year. The academy 

 was founded in 1820 by royal edict of Louis 

 XVIII., although its name appeared as early 

 as 1804 as an entirely ephemeral institution, 

 the chief interest attaching to it being that Dr. 

 Guillotin was one of its presidents. The 

 French Eevolution, with its ruthless sub- 

 mergence of all that pertained to the old order 

 of things, dissolved all medical associations, 

 and among these the Academy of Surgery and 

 the Royal Society of Medicine, which after 

 nearly a century of existence disappeared, to 

 come to life again in the founding of the 

 present Academy of Medicine. The initial 

 concept of the academy was the formation of 

 a body which, by its scientific labors and 

 achievements, should be an asset to the state 

 in matters of public health. The decree which 

 constituted it lays down certain functions 

 which it was to carry on. Among them were 

 improvements in the method of vaccination 

 against smallpox, the measures for the control 

 of epidemic diseases, regulations as to and con- 

 cerning legal jurisprudence, and the examina- 



tion of and passing on new remedies, together 

 with the limitation of the sale of nostrums, 

 both those of French and those of foreign ori- 

 gin. While the present academy still holds 

 the latter function, its work, to a large degree, 

 is hampered by the administration of French 

 law, as was pointed out in a former editorial. 

 The Bulletin of the Academy for Dec. 20- 

 22, 1920, is devoted to a review of the history 

 and labors of the society since its foundation. 

 It records a century's achievement by men 

 whose names are known the world over: Pi- 

 nel, Laennec and Broussais in the early days; 

 Trousseau in the thirties; Villemin and Pas- 

 teur, and on down through the list of those 

 who have added to the sum of certain knowl- 

 edge which has lifted medicine from scientific 

 guesswork to the dignity of a precise science. — 

 Journal of the American Medical Association. 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



RESISTANCE TO STEM RUST IN KANRED 

 WHEAT 



A OYTOLOGICAL study of Puccinia graminis 

 tritici on Kanred wheat, conducted by the Of- 

 fice of Cereal Investigations in cooperation 

 with the California Agricultural Experiment 

 Station, has yielded several facts of interest. 



The strain of stem rust under observation 

 and herein reported was obtained from the 

 Berkeley breeding plats. Seedlings of suscep- 

 tible varieties of wheat grown in the green- 

 house produced abiuidant pustules but, in re- 

 peated trials with Kanred, the fungus failed 

 even to produce flecks. 



It was found that the urediniospores germi- 

 nate readily on Kanred leaves and that the 

 germ tubes make their way directly to the 

 stomata. On reaching a stoma, the tip of the 

 germ tube swells to form an appressorium and 

 practically all of the protoplasm flows into it, 

 leaving the germ tube empty. Under favor- 

 able conditions for germination these appres- 

 soria develop promptly and in great numbers. 

 Often one may observe two, three, and even 

 four spores, with their appressoria, crowded 

 together at a single stoma. 



In spite of this, relatively few appressoria 

 enter the stomatal slit in Kanred to form my- 



