Septembek 13, 1907] 



SCIENCE 



349 



ment agrees with Smith's earlier statements; 

 Bulletin 17.) 



3. Typical watermelon-wilt in the pots in- 

 oculated with the watermelon-FusariMm. All 

 of the ten plants growing in this autoclaved 

 soil contracted the disease. They were watered 

 with distilled water until the plants began to 

 develop the wilt, and then they were watered 

 with ordinary hydrant water. 



(4) All the uninoculated plants (30 pots) 

 remained free from disease. 



Because one fungus in a group is a feeble 

 parasite, it does not follow that all are, and 

 especially in the absence of experimental data. 

 The writer never maintained that all species 

 of the form-genus Fusarium were active pro- 

 ducers of disease. In fact, when he began to 

 study this group, all of them were supposed 

 to be saprophytes, and he was, I believe, the 

 first one to maintain and to demonstrate that 

 certain members of the group are among our 

 most destructive fungi. This work has been 

 built upon largely in certain quarters, with 

 very scant credit to the writer. Such matters, 

 however, even themselves up in the long run 

 and credit finally goes where it belongs. 



The moral of all this is that when one 

 assumes the role of critic he ought to be 

 reasonably certain of his facts. 



Erwin F. SillTH 



August, 1907 



ENGLISH AS SHE IS WRITTEN 



Ever since it was authoritatively decided 

 that « The United States is," and not " are," 

 there has been increasing departure from what 

 was not long ago considered good grammar, 

 especially in the newspapers. We do not ex- 

 pect the " dailies " to lead in correct diction, 

 however desirable this would be from the fact 

 that the reading of the bulk of our population 

 is done in their columns, and serves the 

 younger generations as their preferred literary 

 food. We are so accustomed to having the 

 papers pervert the nation's English that we 

 rather expect to see all kinds of grammatical 

 and syntactic horrors perpetrated in our 

 morning papers. And Science could hardly 

 be expected to bring much pressure to bear 



upon the journalistic world in inducing them, 

 e. g., to use the nominative instead of the 

 accusative case when stating that " whom it 

 is well known has been," etc., a forin to be 

 found in every daily for the last two or three 

 years. But when Science, as well as some 

 other journals of high standing, admits into 

 its columns such statements as that " the 

 underlying strata was a soft limestone," and 

 that " this phenomena was closely observed by 

 us," and that " we owe this data to the cour- 

 tesy of Mr. ," it does seem that the re- 

 striction of the scientific curriculum to so 

 much language study as is provided for in 

 the high schools is proving unfortunate. Per- 

 haps the inauguration of the much-needed 

 spelling reform, which is considered by some 

 as obliterating important landmarks, has con- 

 tributed to the feeling of linguistic irresponsi- 

 bility on the part of juvenile specialists in 

 particular. But would it not be proper to 

 consider the correction of such palpable mis- 

 takes as part of the duty editors owe to the 

 public; if only to prevent us from being 

 charged with illiterate perversion of the lan- 

 guage by our cousins across the Atlantic? 



E. W. HiLGARD 



Berkeley, Cal., 

 August, 1907 



[The proofs of Science are read eacli week by 

 three professional proofreaders, and most, though 

 unfortunately not all, grammatical errors are cor- 

 rected. Errors such as those quoted by our cor- 

 respondent are like infringements of the etiquette 

 of polite society — ^they are especially dreaded; but 

 they are minor matters, and may indeed be in the 

 line of linguistic evolution. It must be admitted 

 that the English language is used with greater 

 correctness and skill by men of science in Great 

 Britain than in the United States. This is prob- 

 ably due to the fact that English men of science 

 come as a rule from a comparatively small class 

 in which the use of correct English is a social 

 tradition. — Editor. ] 



THE ARTIFICIAL PRODUCTION OF MUTANTS 



In Science for July 19 Professor T. D. A. 

 Cockerell gives an appreciative review of 

 Tower's " Investigation of Evolution in 

 Beetles of the Genus Leptinoiarsa" a recent 



