April 18, 1902.] 



SCIENCE. 



607 



retained as the universal langTiage of sci- 

 ence, or that some one language could be 

 agreed upon in which the abstracts of all 

 scientific papers should be published as a 

 prerequisite to international recognition, or 

 at the very least, that the authors of all 

 important papers would follow the good 

 example set by some of the Japanese and 

 Russian writers. These men publish with 

 their papers a summary in some other lan- 

 guage. Such sununaries need not be long. 

 They should be, preferably, in English, 

 German or French, since these are the lead- 

 ing scientific languages of the world, so 

 far as quality and bulk of publication are 

 concerned. 



Of special journals devoted to plant 

 pathology there were none twenty years 

 ago ; now there are five or six. Very many 

 of the general journals of botany also now 

 publish long papers on diseases of plants. 



The time is too brief to cite all of the 

 interesting special papers which have ap- 

 peared during the last twenty years, even 

 if it were desirable. I may, however, men- 

 tion the following as interesting examples 

 of what has been done at home and abroad. 

 First, perhaps, in importance comes de 

 Bary's pioneer paper on Sclerotinia and 

 sclerotinial diseases. Hartig has published 

 numerous very interesting papers on the 

 diseases of trees and of timber. "Woronin 

 published a beautiful paper on Tuhercinia 

 trientalis and several equally interesting 

 ones on sclerotinial diseases. Sadabeck 

 and Johanson have added much to our 

 IcQowledge of the Taphrinas. Frank has 

 published several interesting communica- 

 tions on a Gnomoiiia disease of the cherry, 

 in which he not only points out the cause 

 of the disease, but also a remedy for the 

 same. Burrill and those who followed him 

 have worked out conclusively the etiology 

 of pear blight. Savastano, Cavara and 

 others have done the same for the olive 

 knot. Many other diseases have also been 



shown to be due to specific bacteria, one 

 of the best recent papers being by Jones, 

 of Vermont, on a soft rot of the carrot and 

 other plants. Brefeld has shown for many 

 of the smuts that they can vegetate for 

 long periods in forms resembling yeasts. 

 In a magnificent paper on corn smut the 

 same author has shoAvn clearly that, unlike 

 most smuts, the pustules appear in about 

 fourteen days from the time of infection, 

 and that only young, actively growing tis- 

 sues can be infected. Ward in a remark- 

 ably fine paper showed a certain lily dis- 

 ease to be due to Botrytis. Woods has 

 brought a whole class of diseases into 

 prominence by demonstrating the spot dis- 

 ease of carnations to be due to insect punc- 

 tures. Various workers have shown that 

 insects and mollusks are frequently the 

 indirect cause of disease by carrying bac- 

 teria and the spores of parasitic fungi from 

 diseased to healthy plants. Galloway dem- 

 onstrated the early blight of potatoes to 

 be due to an Alternaria. Peglion in Italy 

 proved a destructive spot disease of musk- 

 melon to be due to another Alternaria. 

 Dorsett has demonstrated that a third spe- 

 cies causes the vexatious spot disease of 

 violet leaves. Barclay, Plowright, Schroe- 

 ter, Winter, Magnus, Klebahn, Dietel, von 

 Tubeuf, Farlow, Thaxter, Carleton and 

 Arthur have all contributed to our knowl- 

 edge of those perplexing rusts which grow 

 alternately on widely different plants. 

 Eriekson has demonstrated the existence 

 on related plants of morphologically sim- 

 ilar rusts which are incapable of cross- 

 inoculation. Thaxter has shown that the 

 potato scab is due to a minute fungus, 

 Oospora scabies. Laurent has published 

 two very interesting papers on the causes 

 of immunity, one dealing with bacterial 

 potato rots and the other with the distribu- 

 tion of the mistletoe in Belgium. W. G. 

 Smith has published interesting papers on 

 the histology of galls due to Taphrina and 



