Ill 
NUTMEGS AND MACE 
135 
moulds. This is found on both surfaces of the leaf in 
the form of more or less rounded patches, which may run 
together, covering the leaf to a considerable extent. In 
the one which occurs on the nutmeg, the black mycelium 
forms a much -branched network, and has a knotted 
appearance under the lens, caused by an abundance 
of short rounded branchlets. The fruit generally found 
towards the centre of the mycelium patch is in the form 
of minute globular sessile balls. A very similar plant 
grows on Stephanotis. 
These soot-moulds are usually stated to occur only 
on the excreta of one of the coccids, or scale -'insects, 
and to be harmless to the plant. In the case of the one 
on the nutmeg leaves, I have found no trace of insects 
on the leaves at all. 
Eutypa erumpens, Massee. — This fungus is reported 
as causing the death of nutmeg trees as well as cocos 
and other trees in Trinidad and Grenada. It is probably 
a wound parasite. It forms irregular black patches on 
the bark, varying in size from J in. to 2 in. across. The 
patches have a dull rough surface, in which the perithecia 
of fungus are sunken, and only the ostioles project ; they 
are short and beak-shaped. The asci are club-shaped, 
8-spored, and borne on long stalks. The spores are 
unicellular and transparent {Bull, Agric., Trinidad, 
1909, p. 61 ; West Indian Bulletin, x. 3, p. 243). 
The Eutypas have a habit of not appearing in the 
fruiting stage until after the tree is quite dead, sometimes 
not for a week or more. Nothing can be done when a 
tree trunk is badly attacked to save it, but the disease 
should not be allowed to spread by having dead trunks 
or branches about the estate, so that the fungus can 
develop its spores and infect other plants. All dead 
wood should be removed and burnt. 
f) 
FRUIT GANGRENE 
This disease of the nutmeg fruit is due to a fungus 
which attacks the husk and produces an opening of 
