60 The Potutoe Plague. 
be left in the open field. We, however, particularly recom- 
mend that potatoes should not be removed into inhabited 
rooms. 
With regard to the treatment of potatoes already attacked 
with the disease, we have to state that in this early stage of 
our investigation we do not feel justified in proposing to your 
Excellency any mode of positive treatment, this subject we 
reserve for a future report; but we may remark that expo- 
sure to light and dryness, in all cases, retards the progress of 
alterations, such as the disease in question, and we therefore 
suggest that all such potatoes should, as far as possible, be so 
treated. 
We do not mean to represent that these recommendations, 
if carried into effect, will prevent the occurrence of disease in 
potatoes, but we feel assured that the decay will extend less 
rapidly and less extensively under these circumstances than 
if the potatoes, when taken from the ground, be at once pitted 
in the usual manner. Neither do we offer these suggestions 
to your Excellency as a final means of securing the crop, but 
merely as a method of retarding the progress of an enemy 
whose history and habits are yet but imperfectly known, 
whilst we endeavor to ascertain the means of more com- 
pletely counteracting its injurious effects, if any such can 
be discovered. 
All which we submit to your Excellency’s consideration, 
and remain your Excellency’s obedient and faithful servants, 
Ropert KANE, 
JOHN LINDLEY, 
Lyon PLayrar. 
In France, the French Academy of Arts and Sciences 
deputed M. Charles Morren, of Liege, to examine into the 
cause of the potatoe rot. Mr. Morren is a foreigner, and his 
selection by the French, for this inquiry, is a sufficient guar- 
