phesident's addbess. 199 



Duchartre and Cornu, judged it tlicir duty to give, that notable 

 Society, a description of tho different forms of the fungus which 

 caused the disease. 



The following facts then became known : That for two years 

 many agriculturists had their crops of cereals completely de- 

 stroyed by the Puccinia graminis ; that the invasions of the 

 Puccinia were all, or nearly all, made round about Berberis vul- 

 garis plants ; that the official Department of Agriculture had 

 ashed the North Eastern Railway Company, for years back, that 

 the Berberis which had been planted on the railway sides might 

 be rooted up, because of the complaints of neighbouring agri- 

 culturists. That there were districts in France where, before 

 the destruction of the Berberis, the cultivation of wheat had 

 been quite impossible. 



I will note, in passing, that the suspicion of the relationship 

 between the Berberis and the Rust is very ancient. In 1660 

 the Rouen Parliament ordered that, for this reason, all the 

 Berberis plants should be destroyed, while Arthur Young, the 

 celebrated English economist, travelling in France in the last 

 century, and being informed of this relation, declared that he 

 did not believe it. 



The Report of the Commission of the French Agricultural 

 Society, published only six months ago, runs as follows : — 



' ' The Berberis plants cause grave risks to cereals .... 

 their destruction is advisable. If the Berberis were all de- 

 stroyed the leaves of cereals contaminated with Puccinia graminis 

 would be absolutely without the smallest risk." It is proposed 

 that the Government shall oblige all landed proprietors to destroy 

 the Berberis in their woods and hedges. 



In the same session of the French Agricultural Society, in 

 which the Report was approved, Prof. Cornu said that, in his 

 opinion, the study of the Uredinece (or Aecidiomycetes) parasites 

 of plants was complete at the present time, it being perfectly 

 demonstrated that the Puccinia graminis can only live upon the 

 cereals and the Berberis vulgaris. 



I should remark that I cannot concur with Prof. Cornu in 

 this latter part. In Portugal, where the Berberis vulgaris is an 



