56 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
ground level, and an ugly wound results. No bulb treated in this 
manner can be expected to remain free from disease in an infected 
soil, and the practice doubtless helps to spread Tylenchus. Wherever 
it is practicable, the flower stalks should be cut an inch or so above the 
ground. 
When bulbs are in a dormant state it is a very difficult matter 
to distinguish one which is healthy from one which is slightly diseased : 
in fact, it seems quite impossible without cutting open the bulb. Ac- 
counts have been heard of many growers' experiences in this matter. 
For instance, bulbs have been carefully hand-picked, and those passed 
as apparently sound have been " trayed." Within a fortnight the 
bulbs have again been re-examined and numbers destroyed as unsale- 
able. This goes on and on, so that it is not surprising to hear the 
remark that the disease spreads rapidly in storage. I do not think it 
is a case of a diseased bulb affecting its neighbouis to which the cause 
of this rapid spreading can be attributed, but rather that the bulbs 
passed as sound were slightly diseased, and after a week or more the 
eelworms had made their efforts recognizable. That such seems likely 
is seen from the following : healthy bulbs have been placed in trays 
among diseased ones and left over a period of three months, at the end 
of which time the latter were a decayed and rotten mass and the healthy 
bulbs still plump and hard, but probably not free from eelworms on 
their outer scales. No trace of eelworms could be found inside the 
healthy bulbs. It is not to be implied that no harm will result 
by storing the bulbs under bad conditions. Certain factors, such as 
humidity of atmosphere and temperature, may aid to bring about 
the decay of bulbs very rapidly. 
For experimental purposes it was necessary to divide the bulbs 
into two classes, viz. healthy and diseased, and a simple method was 
devised in order to distinguish them. As clean a sample as it was 
possible to obtain was classed as healthy, and a diseased stock was 
obtained of the same variety. Of the diseased stock all bulbs which 
were evidently badly diseased and incapable of growth were discarded. 
The others were topped by cutting off a quarter of an inch or so of the 
bulb at the neck. After a little experience it was possible to distin- 
guish with confidence the brown scale affected with eelworm from the 
brown scale resulting from natural decay and withering. The healthy 
bulbs were treated in the same manner. Topping is not detrimental, 
providing it is performed shortly after the bulbs are lifted. At such a 
time the growing part is not touched, and the bulb heals its wound 
before planting time arrives. A precaution should be taken to dip the 
cut neck in sulphur as a preventive against other diseases. There is 
another point in connexion with the topping of bulbs which must not 
be lost sight of, more particularly in compound bulbs. It sometimes 
happens that the eelworm spreads from the neck of the parent bulb 
down to the basal plate, along which it travels to the offset. Should 
the disease originate in the offset it may in like manner affect the 
parent bulb. The disease then spreads upwards from the base, usually 
