I 9°5\ Journal of the Mitchell Society. 65 



England, described many fungi of the Carolinas; to Ravenal, 

 of South Carolina, the first to publish exsiccati of American 

 fungi, and to Louis Bosc, of South Carolina, who published a 

 descriptive list in 1811. 



The embryonic and formative period prepared the way for 

 the third period, beginning about 1885, which may be called 

 the period of growth. It is marked by the development and 

 perfection of the rudimentary principals and discoveries of 

 the preceding periods. It was during this period that the 

 most spectacular conquests were made; that popularization 

 and extension of methods occurred. So great, so numerous, 

 so wonderful were the advances made during the past decade, 

 that we frequently see the statement that little or no progress 

 had been made in plant pathology prior to 1885. The pres- 

 ent day student should, however, bear in mind that it was 

 the persistent, arduous, patient work of the preceding years 

 that rendered possible the progress of the closing years of the 

 century. 



My denomination of this period as 'the period of growth' 

 indicates the nature of the changes which it inaugurates; 

 growth in every direction and concerning every phase of the 

 subject. There has been growth in the list of plant mala- 

 dies. New diseases have been discovered by scores, and old 

 diseases have been found to affect new plants, and diseases 

 hitherto insignificant have taken prominent places as danger- 

 ous foes. The alteration of the plant constitution by, high 

 selection and breeding, the bringing of plants into new cli- 

 matic or soil relations, the more intensive cultivation, the 

 bringing of a susceptible plant into a region where a parasite 

 is already growing upon one of its botanical relatives, thus 

 exposing it to a possible new foe, are conditions that operate 

 to admit of the evolution of new diseases. The growing of 

 plants in large quantities in solid blocks, rather than spar- 

 ingly in scattered gardens, brings about a congested condi- 

 tion comparable with the crowding of our cities, and favors 



