375 
Sugar-Cane in the West Indies. 
canes from Mauritius in 1894, and on specimens of sugar-cane 
in the Kew Herbarium received from India and Borneo. 
Cobb (4) describes it in New South Wales under the name 
of Strumella Sacchari , Cooke, as causing a disease of the 
sugar-cane in the Clarence River district of that colony. 
Prillieux and Delacroix (11) report its existence from Mar- 
tinique, Mauritius, and Tonquin, under the name of Coniothy - 
rium melasporum (Berk.), Sacc. Went (13) has noted a species 
of Melanconium on dead and badly-diseased canes in Java. 
Tryon (20) records M. Sacchari in Queensland. I have 
frequently noted the fungus on dead and badly-diseased sugar- 
canes in many parts of the West Indies. 
The conidia of this Melanconium are formed under the rind 
of the sugar-cane in stromata, from each of which a black 
hair-like filament composed of agglutinated spores is extruded. 
The resulting appearance of the cane and the germination of 
the spores are correctly figured by Massee (5), and by 
Prillieux and Delacroix (11). 
The spores germinate in about twenty hours after sowing, 
and develop a septate branched mycelium in which fusion of 
the hyphae is extremely common. In about five days one 
or more stromata are formed in the drop, and after seven days 
the conidia of the fungus can be detected. This result was 
almost invariably obtained in hanging drops when the food 
material consisted of : — 
cane extract 100 c.c. 
gelatine 15 grams. 
tartaric acid -2 gram. 
peptone *5 gram. 
Beyond the formation of chlamydospores, figured by Went 
(13), in the hyphae, which were obtained in hanging drops, 
plate, and flask-cultures, I have never been able to induce 
this fungus to exhibit any other spore-formation than the 
conidia started with. Went (13) has described a third repro- 
ductive phase of the Java form, namely, large black globose 
conidia which are formed at the ends of the hyphae. 
